


At the Center

by runandgo



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Case Fic, F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Psychological Trauma, Religious Content, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Season/Series 03, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-18
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:22:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 33,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29532621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runandgo/pseuds/runandgo
Summary: We look almost happy out in the sun, while we bleed to death from wounds we don't know about.Tomas Tranströmer.Body-snatching quickly becomes abduction as the BAU is sent to a rural West Virginia town nestled at the base of the Appalachian Mountains. The nature of the case brings back memories and tests the team's willpower at a time when they need each other the most.
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/Spencer Reid, Emily Prentiss & Spencer Reid, Jennifer "JJ" Jareau & Spencer Reid, Penelope Garcia/Jennifer "JJ" Jareau
Comments: 26
Kudos: 68





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Warnings for this fic:** References to and discussion of drug abuse and addiction, graphic depictions of violence, religious violence and abuse, vomiting, and panic attacks/trauma. It is not out of the ordinary for any regular episode of CM, but I wanted to put these warnings just in case.
> 
> i only started watching criminal minds in january but i love me a show with a monster-of-the-week format that still has strong relationships between all the characters. all of their relationships and voices are so precious to me that i couldn't get them out of my head, and well... i ended up having to write fic for it and adding yet another fandom to my frankly ridiculous list of fandoms on ao3.
> 
> are disclaimers on fic still a thing? obviously i don't own any characters from criminal minds. the plot is mine, though :) this fic is unbeta'd because i felt too bad asking my friends to read something outside of their fandoms, so any errors are entirely my own.
> 
> title is from a quote by octavio paz — “I am living at the center of a wound still fresh.”

_We look almost happy out in the sun, while we bleed to death from wounds we don’t know about._  
**Tomas Tranströmer.**

* * *

Like all of Reid’s dreams, it was dark, and he was alone. That was the first thing he knew. 

Presently, he became aware that he was falling down. Falling backwards, into nothingness, and surely at some point he would turn totally over himself, but he couldn’t really remember where he’d started. He could see his own feet, his legs, he was sitting down as he fell, but nothing else; the falling was something he felt, instead, in his inner ear, in the spinning of his head. It was slow motion, even his blinking, and that only made the sudden contrast of his back and head slamming into contact with something even more apparent. There wasn’t any pain, just a total cessation of movement that jolted him so hard it was a wonder he didn’t wake up. 

Then the world was back to speed, and he wasn’t breathing. He was struggling for breath, his lungs tight, the blackness at the edges of his vision crawling in until it was all he could see. He was shaking, but that didn’t even matter; nothing mattered but the pursuit of a gasp of air. He felt so heavy, he could sink right through the old wood floor under his shoulders, and maybe that would be better, anyway, no, surely it would be better. Spencer stumbled to his feet, like maybe there was air higher up, though there never had been before. Blindly, without looking, he took a step, then another, walking without meaning to. His footsteps made splashing sounds, and his ankles were getting wet. There was water flooding the floor, now, getting deeper and deeper, but he only knew because it was cold on his feet. 

The darkness was almost comforting in its totality, and Spencer felt his heartbeat slowing down, the panic leaving his body even as the breath did, too, his lungs wilting. After the exhausting fight to keep breathing, it was peaceful; he didn’t remember it feeling this nice, before. Somehow, his legs were still moving, carrying him somewhere else, somewhere he wouldn’t get to see. 

And then, just as he was used to the idea that he was going, the light started encroaching again, like an outstretched hand, like an unwelcome visitor beating its fists against his door. On his next step, when he picked up his foot, the surface of the water was solid, unyielding to his weight, and he was balanced on top of it, barely sending ripples across the mirrored surface that looked almost like milk with how it was reflecting the sudden glow. Reid’s chest filled with air in one big _whoosh_ , against his will, and the first thing he could do was cry out, “No, I don’t, I don’t want you, let me go, let me-” 

“ _Reid,_ ” came the voice in response, and pulled him out of the depths and into the world again, sharp and cold. 

It was Hotch, standing over Reid, his mouth in a grim line, lit from the back with brilliant orange light that flowed through the slats in the blinds. 

Reid’s mouth stretched into a yawn and he reached up to rub his eyes. He still felt a little like he was underwater, or surrounded in fabric, his senses muffled, and he was freezing cold. “Is it morning?” 

“I think that depends on when you went to bed last night,” Hotch said. 

“I don’t think that’s any of your business.” Spencer winced a little as he sat up. Turned out that a couch in the break room that was really more for decoration than anything else, since they didn’t exactly have copious breaks, was not the most comfortable bed. 

“I need all of you functioning at the height of your ability. As far as I’m concerned, that makes your health my business.” Hotch flicked his eyes over to the stack of papers beside Spencer — more accurately, half-scattered on the floor, half-on his chest. 

Before he could ask, Spencer cut in, “I was working on, um, the geographical profile write-up for the case we did yesterday.” He grit his teeth so they didn’t chatter in the post-sleep chill. “I, ah, I don’t remember how far… Oh, okay, I finished it.” With a tight smile, he handed the file to Hotch and then started to sweep the rest of the pages into something he could pick up. 

“Spencer,” Hotch said, and it was the use of his first name more than anything else that made Reid look up. “Are you all right?” 

_Has anyone who_ wasn’t _all right ever answered that question honestly?_ “Why would you think I wasn’t?” Spencer dodged it instead. 

“You’re sleeping on the couch in the break room instead of going home to your apartment. You fell asleep in the middle of working, which tells me you were probably trying to work through the night. When I came in, you were having a nightmare, you were crying in your sleep. Reid, you don’t need me to tell you…” 

A little taken aback, Spencer reached up and brushed his hand lightly across his face; sure enough, there was a little wetness, tear tracks down his cheeks. He opened his mouth, closed it again, then finally managed to say, “I passed my psych eval, Hotch.” 

“You know the answers to those questions off the top of your head.” Hotch was staring him down mercilessly. Spencer was never a fan of being on the receiving end of that look. 

“Are you saying that I was lying?” 

“I think that sometimes you’re so focused on giving the right answer that you forget that the point is to give the truth,” Hotch fired back. 

Part of Spencer wanted to bite something rude out in response, but the impulse faded as quickly as it came, replaced by bone-deep tiredness like a fire winking out from the wind. “I have to go get changed,” he said, getting up and walking with long strides towards the door, past Hotch, careful not to brush against him even though he came within a breath of it. 

The microwave, when Spencer passed it, informed him in its green blinking letters that it was 6:56. That meant that people wouldn’t be here for an hour or so, which in turn meant that he could probably go shower in the gym without having to pretend he, like, biked to work or something. His go bag was waiting under his desk, like always, and while the Quantico gym showers weren’t exactly Reid’s first choice, he would be fine with just about any hot running water at that moment. 

Reid didn’t see another person until he made it back from the changing room to the main corridor, where a flash of blonde hair and a bright purple dress was his only warning before Garcia hip-checked him, lightly but enough to startle him. “Hey little kitten, did you fall in a well?” she asked, frowning at his wet hair, neither of them breaking stride. 

“Just a shower,” Spencer replied, and shifted his bag to his other shoulder to give Garcia more room beside him. 

“Don’t tell me you’ve started pulling a Derek and working out before work.” 

“Morgan goes to the gym before he comes in?” 

“Sometimes, yeah.” Garcia shouldered open the door and held it for Reid, who in turn passed it to the person behind him; the bullpen was bustling now. “I went to cheer him on once or twice, but well, he doesn’t exactly need it, and me and gyms do not really get along.” 

“Me neither. I was only using the shower, um, the shower at my apartment is broken.” 

“Yuck.” She wrinkled her nose. “That’s no fun. Well, you can use mine at night sometime if you need, I’m not too far from you. We could have a sleepover.” 

Reid laughed a little. “Thanks, Garcia.” 

“Don’t get comfortable,” JJ said by way of greeting, brushing by them both at double-speed and pressing a file into Reid’s chest with enough force to make him slow a bit. 

“I never do,” Spencer said glumly. 

“What’s the _horreur du jour_ this time?” Garcia asked. 

“I guess we’re about to find out.” 

“Hey, Reid, how was your date with the geographical write-ups?” Emily wanted to know as they passed her desk, unwrapping her scarf. “God, it’s cold.” 

“I bet those write-ups had their worlds rocked last night,” Morgan grinned, his coat already slung across the back of his chair, a steaming coffee mug in hand. 

“Very funny,” Reid said. “They were fine, actually.” 

“Can’t have been that hard for you, boy genius.” Morgan steadily turned his chair out of Emily’s path as she reached for his coffee. 

“Not hard, just tedious.” Spencer shrugged. “I can read at a much higher pace than most, but there are unfortunately limits to the speed of the human hand.” 

“Yeah, especially if you want your writing to be legible to anyone else.” 

“Oh, I so badly want to make a joke about the limits of human hand speed,” Emily said, giving up on her coffee quest and slumping back in her chair. The file dropping onto her desk caught her attention, though. “Already?” 

“You know what they say, evil never sleeps,” JJ sighed. 

“Too true, Supergirl,” Garcia said. “Come on. To the Batcave.” 

“Okay, I’m not a huge comic book guy, but even I know you’re mixing things up there,” Morgan pointed out, trailing behind them as they all made their way up to the conference room. 

“It was intentional, though, that makes all the difference. See, if someone just doesn’t _know_ enough, well, that’s one thing, but I do know and therefore-” 

“All right, everyone, we don’t have time to spare, we never do, so I need you all to quiet down so JJ can brief us,” Hotch said, and closed the door behind all of them. Spencer sat down next to Rossi, who hadn’t even bothered to go into his office; he was still wearing his winter coat. 

Like she’d done a thousand times before in the same place, JJ clicked the projector to life. “This is Bird’s Eye, West Virginia, population 560 at the time of the last census. Not far from Morgantown, but closer to the Monongahela National Forest and the Appalachian Mountains. They’ve had five bodies deposited in cemeteries outside five different local churches in the past month.” 

With another click of her remote, the slide changed to a corpse lying in the grass next to a headstone, white as a sheet, with wounds covering its skin. “This one was in the churchyard at Holy Sanctuary Baptist this morning. The pastor found it. He lives on the premises and had just gotten up to pray. Throat slit, carotid artery severed, disemboweled, no evidence of sexual assault. Same MO as the other bodies. Because it’s so rural and they’re dropping them before the sun is up, no one saw anything.” 

“Do we know who this person was?” Rossi asked. 

JJ shook her head. “Waiting on IDs from the coroner’s office. No one from the town’s been reported missing, and in a place that small, word spreads fast. Garcia-” 

“I’ll check missings in the surrounding states, and I’ll widen it if I can’t find anything there,” Garcia nodded. 

“Thank you,” Hotch said. “What else?” 

“All of the bodies had their internal organs removed. Everything above the neck was intact, brain, eyes, but most things below were taken out. Heart, liver, lungs, kidneys, intestines, pretty much everything except the reproductive organs.” JJ clicked through again, more shots of other bodies. “But it gets weirder.” 

“Of course it does,” Morgan muttered. 

“None of the causes of death were exsanguination or even injury-related at all. They were all drug overdoses. The wounds were done post-mortem.” Now the screen showed close-ups of the bodies; track marks on arms, needle punctures livid on the skin. Reid turned his head and coughed; it felt like his arm was on fire, suddenly, like something under his skin recognized the sight. It was a physical thing, the want, an itch that he could scratch at for hours and never soothe, and it was sudden but strong just like it always was. 

“Forced overdoses?” Hotch asked, flipping his file open to study them. “What kinds of drugs?” 

“Again, we don’t have IDs on any of the bodies yet, so it’s hard to say if it was coerced or not, but they all had signs of prior drug use. Mostly heroin and prescription drugs, oxycodone, valium.” 

“West Virginia has the highest rate of deaths from drug overdoses per capita in the country,” Reid added. He fiddled with the edges of his file and tried to wrangle his heartbeat back to a normal speed. 

“And it’s only getting worse,” Morgan sighed. “Whoever did this probably knew that.” 

“It’s not easy to drain the blood from a body after it’s dead,” Emily pointed out, wincing. 

“No,” Reid agreed. “The blood flow is very minimal after the heart stops.” 

“It takes time and patience,” Hotch said, glancing up, “and privacy for both of those things.” 

Morgan frowned, his eyebrows drawing together. “Something like this could point to medical knowledge, but hunters would also know how to do it.” 

“Yeah, and the fresher the bodies are, the easier it would be for him,” Reid said. He was jiggling his foot under the table, but whacked his knee on the metal leg and stopped. 

“So the question is whether the unsub is finding bodies…” Rossi started. 

“..or if he’s killing them himself,” Emily finished. 

“If he’s not, he will be soon,” Hotch said, and stood up. “Thanks, JJ. Wheels up in 20, everyone, it’s a short flight.” 

Spencer pushed past the others and made it to his desk first, gathering files and a few books before tossing them into his messenger bag. He clipped his gun and holster to his belt, then put his coat on. Under the satin lining of the peacoat, his arm still ached, hypersensitive. _You’re being dramatic,_ he thought firmly, and jammed his hat on. 

“You’re bundled up,” Emily said, her bag slung over her shoulder by its strap, her coat on her arm. “Can’t handle the cold, Nevada?” She pronounced it with a long _a_ , like the vowels would sound in the Spanish word. 

“It’s actually pronounced Nevada,” Reid said. “Spanish origin, but the official pronunciation is with the short a sound. And it snows there, it gets cold.” 

“Not like it does here,” Morgan said. He had his jacket unzipped over his grey shirt, so you could hardly see the FBI insignia on the left breast. “And here is nothing compared to-” 

“Chicago, we know,” JJ said, seemingly appearing out of nowhere. Her hair was a little rumpled, and though she was trying to hide it, she was smiling. “Hey, Pittsburgh gets pretty cold too.” 

“Nothing like the lake effect. Hey, JJ, you look like the cat that got the cream.” Morgan grinned encouragingly at her. “What’s goin’ on?” 

She shifted her go-bag from one shoulder to the other. “Nothing, I just got a really good night of sleep last night, so I’m in a good mood.” 

“Are you seeing somebody, Agent Jareau?” Prentiss asked, a conspiratory smile on her face. 

JJ’s eyes widened and she half-laughed. “Um, I’m not going to dignify that with a response.” 

“That’s not a no,” Spencer pointed out. Normally he preferred to stay out of this kind of discussion, but distraction was good right now. 

“We’re gonna be late,” JJ avoided the question again. 

“There’s plenty of time to grill you!” called Emily at her back as she disappeared through the door, her sheet of blonde hair swinging behind her. 

“She pulled her phone out while she was leaving, she was texting somebody,” Derek observed. 

“Well, she can’t hide it for long,” Emily said. 

“Maybe she just doesn’t wanna tell us?” Reid suggested, leaning back on his desk, both hands holding the strap of his bag. 

“Maybe. But she’s been in such a good mood for a while, this is a perfect explanation.” When Spencer raised his eyebrows at her, Emily put up her hands, a placating gesture. “I’m not gonna push it, Reid, I promise. I’m really just happy she’s happy.” 

“You don’t _know_ it’s because of a relationship, though.” 

“A woman just knows these things, young doctor,” Emily intoned, and swept out through the door, trailing her coat as dramatically as she could. 

“I really think most of it has less to do with being a woman and more to do with not being me,” Reid mused. 

Morgan laughed and swept some papers into his bag. “Don’t be too hard on yourself, kid. I think you’re just not looking in the same places everyone else does. That’s not a bad thing, trust me.” 

By the time the rest of them made it onto the plane and they had taken off safely, Rossi had already started the coffee, and Emily had a mug in hand and was waiting eagerly for it to be done. Spencer flipped his bag onto a seat and sat down next to it; he could wait. Hotch was already across from him on the other side of the table, papers spread wide on the surface, and when Reid dropped into his field of vision, he looked up. “Do you think we can create a geographical profile based off of the dump sites if the unsub isn’t killing the victims?” 

“I’m not sure,” Spencer answered honestly. “I mean, I think it’s likely that the unsub at least lives around Bird’s Eye if he keeps returning to the town to dump the bodies, but the fact that we don’t even know _if_ he’s killing them, let alone where the murders occur or where the victims are originally from, makes things significantly more difficult.” 

“Pretty much everything about the fact that we don’t know if he’s killing or not makes things more difficult,” Morgan said, taking a seat on the couch towards the front of the jet. 

“We’ll need to make two different timelines, then,” Hotch said. “One for if he’s just stealing the bodies, and one for if he’s killing them.” 

“Not two different profiles?” Prentiss asked, shifting forwards in her seat to peer at the photos more closely. 

“Probably not,” Spencer said. “If the unsub is body-snatching, he clearly needs fresh bodies, or else he would probably be disturbing graves in the local cemeteries or attempting to break into coroners’ offices. And if he needs fresh bodies, he’s not going to have a supply forever.” 

“Well, how do we know he’s not?” 

“How do you know anything that you know?” Garcia’s voice echoed from the speakers as JJ came into view, carrying her laptop. “Evil never sleeps, but neither do I. First thing I did was check for reports of cemetery tampering or any other kind of bone-rattling. Nothing within a hundred miles that seemed to match, it was mostly your kids playing pranks and your garden-variety creeps who got caught. _Then_ I did a once-over on the missing persons and still got zilch. But fear not, because there is a pattern. Two nights before the bodies turned up in the churchyards, every time, there were radioed police reports of unresponsive people in alleys or rough areas in Morgantown and Granville, and no one was found at the scene when EMTs arrived.” 

“I guess they figured that the people just got up and walked away,” Morgan muttered, his hands clenching and unclenching where they rested on his legs. 

“I mean… no one IDed any of the people. No one reported missing. There’s not much more they _can_ do,” JJ pointed out. 

“This could be a vigilante,” Emily said, meeting Garcia’s eyes through the webcam. “Trying to clean up the streets.” 

“But then why drop the bodies in a small town?” Rossi shuffled his papers, narrowing his eyes. “That doesn’t make sense if it’s vigilantism; he’d want everyone to know.” 

“It feels more ritualistic or compulsive to me,” Morgan said, settling back in his seat. “He obviously has a process he has to go through, and I think that’s what’s driving him.” 

“Always two nights, Garcia?” Hotch asked. 

“Yes, sir. Never longer, never shorter. One night there’s a call, a person assumedly goes missing, nothing for a day, then the morning after, some unsuspecting pastor gets a present. Clocks in at roughly 33 hours between 911 call and the… um, delivery.” 

“And nobody saw anything in any of the instances where the unresponsive bodies were reported?” he continued. 

“Well, I mean, someone must have noticed and called something in, but I get the feeling that whoever did it didn’t hang around to see if the police might show up,” Garcia said, pushing her studded glasses up on her nose. 

“Any way we can get the original 911 calls on those nights, Garcia?” 

“‘Tis but the work of a moment, sir,” she replied, and the screen went dark. 

“So the unsub has a radio that can tune into the police frequencies,” Morgan said. “He listens and waits for a body, goes and picks it up, mutilates it, and dumps it.” 

“His luck is gonna run out eventually,” Prentiss said. “I mean, he’s only taking drug overdoses, _and_ he has to beat the police there. That’s pretty specific.” 

“Let’s start from the beginning with MO. I think we’ll run ourselves in circles if we don’t.” Hotch pulled out the file for the first body and laid the picture on top. “Victim number one. White female, mid-30s, blonde hair, brown eyes. Found on December 5th in the cemetery at Asbury United Methodist, which is on Fraser Road, to the north of town. Reid, I know we’re not sure yet about the geographical profile, but could you mark these down anyway? There’s a map of the town and the surrounding area behind everything else. JJ, text Garcia and ask her to do the same thing with the original sites mentioned in the 911 calls. I’m not optimistic about that, but it’s worth a try.” 

Nodding, Spencer pulled out the printout and a bright red marker, drew a big dot on the church site. 

“Superficial wounds to the body, likely from hard living, now that we know where these people are going missing from,” Rossi noted. “And of course, the big money.” 

“Total disembowelment,” Reid said. “It’s in line with the crimes. Historically, body-snatching had its greatest vogue in periods where medical corpses weren’t readily available. It was a way to make a quick buck, to steal fresh bodies or dig them up and sell them to universities.” 

“But people don’t need that anymore,” JJ said uncertainly, crossing her arms over her chest. 

“Well, not for legal research sites,” Spencer said. “If the unsub doesn’t have a legal way of getting the bodies, then he could resort to stealing them. But like Prentiss said, he’s been incredibly lucky so far. Eventually, he’s gonna need a body for whatever he’s using them for and there won’t be one. That’s when he’ll kill. Just like Burke and Hare. They were two serial killers in Edinburgh, Scotland in the 1820s who made so much profit from selling bodies…” 

“...that they started to create them, too,” Rossi filled in. 

“But obviously there’s not that kind of market anymore,” Morgan said. “So do we assume he’s using them for himself?” 

“If he is, he’s not very good at it yet,” Reid said, flipping back to the page with the close-up of the latest corpse’s cavity. “These cuts where he removed the organs, they aren’t surgically precise, they’re rough and untrained.” 

“Okay, if no one else is going to ask the gross questions, I will,” Emily sighed, and pinched the bridge of her nose. “He’s not sexually assaulting the bodies. Do we think he’s eating them? You wouldn’t need surgical cuts for that.” 

“It’s definitely not sexual in nature, if he is,” Rossi said. “He’s crossing the kinds of lines sexual sadists don’t cross: race, age, gender.” 

“Plus we know that because he’s not hurting them before they’re dead, he’s not getting off on their pain,” Morgan added. 

“I highly doubt he’s psychotic, either. There’s too much control here. Someone psychotic wouldn’t have the restraint or the organization that this unsub is showing,” Hotch said, rifling through other autopsy images. “There are no deliberate wounds on the body other than the disembowelment, and it takes patience to wait for bodies to show up, patience that a psychotic wouldn’t have, even at the beginning of a break.” 

“Are we crossing cannibal off the list, then, too?” JJ asked. 

“For now, unless we find evidence to the contrary,” Hotch confirmed. 

“So basically, we don’t really know what’s going on,” Emily said, and leaned her elbow on the table, her chin in her palm. 

“You know that won’t be true forever,” Morgan offered. “Unsubs like this, once they’ve got a pattern, they’re not gonna break it. We’ll hear from him again, probably sooner rather than later.” 

“When we land, Morgan and Prentiss, I want you two to go to Morgantown and brief the police there about the unsub going after drug overdoses. Visit any of the areas where bodies were reported, try and get a feeling for the physical limitations of the unsub if you can. Rossi, you go to the coroner’s office and take a look at the bodies, see what they can tell you. JJ, you can go with him and get set up, the sheriff’s station is right next door. Reid, you and I will go to the latest dump site and see if we can find anything from the scene.” Hotch’s eyebrows drew together as he finished the assignments, and Spencer knew he was already trying to figure out how they could make the most difference in the smallest amount of time, a frustrating endeavor in a case so devoid of information so far. And the worst truth about their job was that logically, wishing for more information meant wishing for more bodies. 

Reid had heard other members of the team say that they had bad feelings about cases before, either about unsubs or about potential outcomes, and while he’d intellectually understood it, he had never had that same instinct — not until it was too late, anyway. But something about this one gave him a sick, sideways feeling, like walking on a surface that was on a different angle from the rest of the world. It wasn’t the worst thing he’d ever seen, by far, but something about it struck him, and knowing not just with his mind but with every atom in his body that this would be a hard one made it that much more difficult to face. 

Outside the window, he tried to find something to stare at, a piece of nature, something that wasn’t a cut-up body or the sterile leather seats of the plane or the grisly details of a case that he’d already committed to memory against his will, but the only thing visible was a stretch of endless white, like maybe the team was the only thing left, like maybe everything else had fallen away. 

* * *

Landing and deplaning was the usual flurry of activity and division of the group into black Suburbans, and it was only once Reid was sitting in a passenger seat with his go-bag thrown in the back and his messenger bag under his feet that he realized it was snowing. When Hotch got in and turned the key, bringing the car rumbling to life underneath them, he had flurries in his hair, and the sight was almost funny in its incongruousness, enough to bring a smile to Spencer’s face. 

Hotch followed the trail of Spencer’s gaze up to his own hair and combed the flakes gently out. “Better get used to it,” he said. “It’s going to snow all day. We have to try and get to the scene fast, before the snow covers everything up.” He turned, bracing his arm on the seat behind Spencer to back out of the parking space. “You can go ahead and put the church address into the GPS, it’s on the first page of the file. And Reid...” He waited until Spencer looked up from the pages on his lap to meet his eyes, then nodded at Spencer’s hair. 

“What?” Reid said, and instinctively touched it, surprised when his fingers came away wet. He pulled down the mirror on his side and saw his hat and the hair that stuck out from under it covered in snow, trapped in the parts his mom used to call curls but that he was pretty sure didn’t count. Out of the corner of his eye, he could barely see Hotch’s mouth threaten to twitch into a smile. 

It wasn’t too long of a drive to the church, a little white-washed square building nestled in at the edge of a forest that was winter-bald. There wasn’t even a parking lot, just a sign, the building, and an open expanse of lawn; Hotch pulled off the road to the crunching of gravel and then the soft bump of frozen ground, stopping and putting the car in park right outside the steps. 

In front of the door, there was a tall, older man wearing a thick coat and a scarf that covered him from his top button all the way to the bottom of his glasses. As he hurried down the steps towards the car upon seeing the doors open, it unraveled and fell to either side of his neck, revealing a blue button-down with a clerical collar. “You must be the FBI,” he said in a broad Southern drawl, enough to turn the diphthong of the _I_ into a single _ah_ sound. 

“I’m Agent Hotchner. This is Dr. Reid,” Hotch said, shaking the man’s outstretched hand while Reid waved. “You’re Reverend Thomas?” 

“Sure am. This is Holy Sanctuary,” he said, gesturing over his shoulder. “Congregation of about forty, give or take.” 

“That’s a small church.” 

“Well, times aren’t great for church attendance,” Thomas said, “but it’s a small building, you understand. The congregation’s never been much larger than fifty or maybe sixty.” 

“How long has the church been active?” Reid asked, falling into step beside Hotch and the reverend as they started to walk around the opposite side of the building. 

“Oh, since about 1920. I’ve been pastor here for about ten years. You can probably tell from my accent that I’m from farther south. Georgia.” 

“What made you move here?” Hotch asked. 

“My granddaughter got into WVU,” Thomas said, a note of pride in his voice. “I didn’t want her to be alone out here. She’s been graduated, of course, moved to Pittsburgh, but a congregation this small… you form a rapport. It’s nice. My church back in Georgia was over two hundred.” 

“Are you married?” Reid flicked his eyes over to the house that stood behind the church; a light was on in the front window, and smoke was billowing from the chimney into the sky, mixing with the snow as it spiraled upwards. 

“Not anymore,” Thomas said. “My wife passed nigh on three years ago now. Just me out here, and I keep to my own schedule. That’s when I saw the body the other morning.” 

“Can you show us where you were when you first saw it?” Hotch said. 

“Well, sure, if you think it’d help.” Thomas veered sharply to the left, leading them up to the house until they were standing on the porch. “I came out here to pray, I do that every morning. I like to be outside, appreciate the Earth that He gave us. Then I go to the graveyard, clean it up if it needs it, replace any flowers that went brown. I didn’t get a chance to do that.” He stretched a finger out, pointing right to the garish yellow caution tape. “Body was right there at the end of the row. White as a sheet.” 

“And it was early, but you didn’t see anyone coming or hear a car?” Spencer craned his neck a little; he could picture the corpse lying there, the feet just barely visible but standing out starkly for sheer lack of color among the grey-brown landscape. 

“The sun had just come up. But the body was already there. It was quiet, I didn’t hear any cars by the time I got up.” 

“Let’s take a closer look,” Hotch said, and the pastor nodded. Again, he took the lead and Reid and Hotch followed him through the low stone arch that led into the graveyard, down the rows of tombstones until they reached the square that had been marked off. 

Reid squatted down and pulled a pair of blue sterile gloves from his pocket. The soft scratching he could hear told him Hotch was putting some on too. “Police already scoured it for evidence,” the reverend said. “They didn’t find anything they could use.” 

“Yeah, the snow’s not gonna help, not that there was much there to begin with,” Reid said. “No drag marks, no distinguishing tire tracks. The body’s head was up here…” He touched the top of the plot. “And the feet were down here. Just like if it had really been buried.” 

“Just like it,” Thomas agreed. “The eyes were closed. Arms were by his sides. If it weren’t so…” For the first time, he looked visibly troubled, and it took him a second to get the next words out. “If the body weren’t so mangled, it’d’ve been nearly peaceful.” 

“And you’re sure you’d never seen the person before?” Reid asked. “It wasn’t someone you knew, maybe some kind of message to you?” 

Slowly, Thomas shook his head. He seemed to be getting older by the minute, recounting the ordeal, the lines on his face deepening. “I won’t pretend I know everyone in this town. I’m a transplant with a small congregation, you see, I’m not a lifelong resident like some of the folks here. I’d never seen him before. But now I know his face like it’s my own. Every time I close my eyes.” He took a shaky breath, a puff of air dissipating into the chill. “You found other bodies here, in Bird’s Eye?” 

“Yes,” Hotch said. “In other cemeteries. We don’t believe your church was a target specifically. You and your congregants have no reason to worry.” 

“Other than as residents of the town,” Thomas said grimly. 

Reid tilted his head to the side; something Hotch had said struck a chord. “It’s not cemeteries.” 

“What do you mean, Reid?” Hotch frowned at him, but not angrily, so he continued. 

“Technically, there’s a difference between cemeteries and graveyards,” he explained. “A cemetery is anywhere bodies are buried, but a graveyard has to be connected to a church. It’s historically part of the churchyard. So every graveyard is a cemetery, but not every cemetery is a graveyard.” 

“He’s right,” Thomas said. “Most people don’t know the distinction.” 

“Well, you could count the traits Dr. Reid shares with most people on one hand,” Hotch said; Reid glanced up to smile at him, but he wasn’t looking. For some reason, Spencer found himself flushing and returning his eyes to the ground. “So the unsub isn’t just dumping the bodies in any resting place.” 

“He needs them to be connected to a church,” Spencer finished. “And he lays them out like they’ve been put to rest.” 

“He’s not just remorseful, he’s religious.” Hotch walked over to stand at the end of the pseudo-grave, and Spencer was hit by a barrage of memories so powerful, more like deep-rooted senses than thoughts, that they almost knocked him over: quoting the Bible with a tongue thickened by thirst, a raised white cross-shaped scar, a prayer mumbled under the crackling of fire that was only-half audible through a haze. He shoved his hand deeper into the snow, losing his balance for a second, the cold rush shocking his nerves. 

“How could a Christian man do something like this?” Thomas whispered, and Spencer dug his fingernails into his palms so hard he felt them break the latex of the gloves. 

“Well, the commandment goes ‘Thou shalt not murder,’” Spencer said, surprisingly even in tone. He stood up fully and flattened out his hands with effort, saw the cross on top of the building come back into view over the top of Thomas’s head. “He’s not murdering.” _Yet._

“Thank you for your help, Reverend.” Briefly, Hotch clasped the man’s hands in his. “If you think of anything else that could help with the investigation, we’ll be at the sheriff’s office. Please don’t hesitate to contact us.” 

“I pray I won’t have to,” Thomas replied, and Reid could see his hands shaking when Hotch let them go. 

When they made it inside the car and the doors were safely closed, Reid spoke up. “We’ll have to ask the pastors at the churches where the bodies were dumped if any of their congregants seemed overly interested in the case. Too much sympathy, not enough.” 

“It’s never a bad place to start,” Hotch said, backing out of the churchyard. “But there’s no pattern to the dump sites. He’s put them in, what, Baptist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Evangelical…” 

“Only one he hasn’t hit is Catholic,” Reid said, “and there’s not a Catholic church within thirty miles here.” 

“The only assumption we can make is that he’s Protestant, and that’s not exactly unusual around here.” Hotch glanced over at Reid. “What was the expression you used once that Morgan liked, ‘it’s like looking for a needle in a stack of other needles?’” 

“Oh, yeah, I did say that,” Spencer remembered. 

“I wish it wasn’t so true,” Hotch said, the crease between his eyebrows deepening as he stared out at the mountains before them. Spencer knew that he was thinking about all the places to hide among those woods, because that was always what they all saw; it was a long-gone thing, to look at a landscape and see only its beauty and not the potential horrors that could take place. 

* * *

Bird’s Eye was one of the sorts of towns with one single, long main drag, popping up as they drove in, old Colonial-style homes and local businesses with peeling paint all in a row, then dying off just as quickly, enough that if Reid squinted he could see the empty spaces farther down, like a mouth missing teeth. The sheriff’s station was nestled next to a convenience store and a house with a Confederate flag pinned to the porch, the medical examiner’s office on the other side, and JJ was already outside when Hotch and Reid pulled up, talking animatedly with a deputy. 

“No, sir, I understand. Well, we appreciate that you want to let the public know, and that you care about the town, but at this time we can’t allow you to give a comment to the local press. This is an ongoing investigation and the FBI is involved-” She caught Hotch’s eye and visibly relaxed, even as the deputy started to march in their direction. “Agent Hotchner will tell you the same thing,” JJ called at his back, but he was already ignoring her. 

“Some psycho is taking people from our town and cutting them up and dropping them here,” the man said, jabbing a finger in Hotch’s direction. “And you expect me not to tell anyone?” 

“We’re not asking you to not tell anyone,” Hotch said calmly. “We’re asking you to keep your comments away from the press, especially if you don’t know the details of the case. These bodies are of people who were abducted from Morgantown, not from Bird’s Eye.” 

“How do you know that?” the deputy asked, his eyes suspicious. His breath smelled like chewing tobacco, Reid could tell even from a few feet away. 

“This is a small town, Deputy. If they had been abducted from here, you would know-” 

“I don’t know everyone who lives around here. There are folks who live out in the woods, don’t call us-” 

“And there were reported bodies in Morgantown before the bodies turned up here,” Hotch finished. “We think that this particular offender is taking drug overdose victims.” 

“Oh,” the deputy said, and his whole body language changed as he peered up at Hotch from under his hat. When the sun hit his face, Reid saw that he was about 25, much younger than he’d seemed from the response and the way he was talking to Hotch at first. “If he’s… if he’s taking them from Morgantown, do you think there’s a chance he’s not from here?” 

“We still think it’s likely that he either lives in this area or grew up here,” Hotch said, in a much more sympathetic tone than was probably merited. “Otherwise he wouldn’t go to the trouble of bringing the bodies back here.” 

Nodding, the deputy stepped back. “I’m sorry for yelling at you, Agent—” 

“Hotchner. This is Agent Jareau,” he nodded towards JJ, “and Dr. Reid.” 

Spencer waved at the deputy, who was taken aback enough that he waved back without even trying to shake Spencer’s hand. 

“I’m Deputy York. Well, I’m sorry for yelling,” he said. “We just don’t get a lot of violent crime around here. It’s not… I guess we all like to think it isn’t that kind of place. But I suppose you hear that a lot.” 

“No one likes to think about this happening where they live,” JJ said. “We’re here to make sure that it stops. We’re here to help.” 

“That’s what Sheriff Ulrich said too.” York shoved a hand in his pocket. “Your other agent is here already, um, Agent Rossi?” 

“Good,” Hotch said. “Excuse us.” JJ opened the door to the station, and Hotch and Reid followed closely behind. The building was small, and bustling with activity. There were only five desks in the main bullpen, with the sheriff’s own office off to the side immediately upon entry, and two smaller conference rooms along the other wall. One door was propped open, and through the window, as JJ walked past them and into the doorway, Spencer saw Rossi pinning photos onto an evidence board. 

A harrowed-looking man in a tan uniform walked up to them at double-time. “You must be Agent Hotchner,” he said, extending a hand. “I’m Sheriff Ulrich. Can’t thank you folks enough for coming down here.” 

“You’ve got a very unique case here, Sheriff,” Hotch said, and shook the man’s hand. 

“God, I wish I didn’t,” Ulrich replied. He had bags under his eyes, and his fingers were stained yellow from nicotine; Spencer didn’t even want to imagine the amount of cigarettes he’d smoked in the past few days. “I’m only sorry I didn’t contact you sooner.” 

“We’re here now, and that’s what matters,” JJ said. 

“You’ve already met Agents Jareau and Rossi, and this is Dr. Spencer Reid.” Hotch checked his watch. “Our other agents drove up to Morgantown to brief the police there. They should be back within the hour.” 

“If I can get you guys anything, just let me know.” Ulrich jerked his head towards the conference room. “Agent Rossi requested, uh, ‘bad cop coffee,’ so there’s some in there already.” 

“It looks like we’ve got everything we need so far,” Hotch said. “Thank you, Sheriff.” 

“My plea- well. You’re welcome.” He tipped his hat at them, and was back in his office before they made it to the conference room. 

“Dave, did you find anything from the bodies?” Hotch asked, clearing a space on the table for his laptop. 

“The ME said that she doubted the overdoses were forced,” Rossi mused. “The amounts of drugs used weren’t overkill; in some cases they might have even survived with medical attention or narcan.” 

“Then we were right, and he’s not killing them,” JJ said. 

“He will be soon,” Reid said. 

“Well, what makes you say that? He hasn’t broken his pattern yet.” 

“Reid is right,” Rossi said. “I think that our unsub only has a cooling-off period because it takes time for bodies to appear, and he’s been lucky so far. But the last time, he found another body only days after he dumped the one before. He’s gonna want the next one even faster.” 

“And with increased patrolling in Morgantown, he might not be able to get one even if there is an overdose,” Hotch murmured. “No, I wouldn’t be surprised if the next news we get from the unsub is an abduction, or a warm body.” 

“Reid, I left the board over there free for you to start your geographical profile.” Rossi pointed in the direction of the other bulletin board, which already had a map of the town, the surrounding highways, and the entrance to the national forest blown up to cover the surface. “Pins and markers are on the table. And Garcia got back to me with the 911 calls. As we imagined, they’re not very forthcoming and the witnesses weren’t identified, but we have rough locations, at least.” 

“Thanks,” Spencer said. “I don’t — I’m not sure how helpful it’ll be.” 

“Anything we can get that doesn’t involve another body is good,” JJ said. 

Spencer always started by marking crime scenes, so that’s what he did, with a thick red marker. In the background, Hotch was briefing JJ and Rossi on what they’d learned from Holy Sanctuary, but it faded into a comforting hum of noise while Spencer worked. Patterns and maps didn’t lie. It was more like trying to decode them until they could tell him the information he needed. Some times took longer than others, and Spencer wasn’t exactly functioning at full capacity, no matter what he told Hotch this morning; he could feel his tiredness behind his eyes, dragging him down like iron weights around his ankles in a swimming pool. But as he worked, it became clearer and clearer that there was a pattern here that Reid didn’t need any training to recognize. 

“He won’t go into town,” he said, and the room went quiet around him. 

“What do you mean?” JJ asked, twisting around to face him from where she was half-sitting on the table. 

“Well, he’s gone into the physical limits of Bird’s Eye, but he hasn’t dumped any bodies on the main drag. There are two churches on the street we’re on right now, um, Warner Street, within the ten blocks that make up the center of town. They both could be candidates for him; it’s Ebenezer Southern Baptist and Winding Creek Presbyterian. But he’s stayed around the edges of town, and much more towards the forest than towards the surrounding towns. It’s expanded his geographical area more than it would have if he’d stayed more to one side.” 

“Well, we already knew he wasn’t trying to attract attention,” Rossi said. “Maybe he feels like this will disturb the fewest people, but still give the bodies a final resting place?” 

“Or he doesn’t feel comfortable in town, around other people,” Hotch said. “He’s active at night. He has to have a location big enough to hold the bodies he takes. He hasn’t communicated with the press or the sheriff.” 

“He’s a recluse,” JJ said. 

“It makes sense.” Rossi leaned down to take a closer look at the board. “If he’s spending his time hunting for bodies, then taking time to mutilate them, people would notice him missing from work, or even around the town in someplace as small as this.” 

“The deputy mentioned that there were people who lived farther out in the woods, people who he rarely saw,” Reid said. “Now, we know that the unsub is willing to travel to Morgantown, probably because he thinks he’ll have a better chance at getting bodies there.” The city barely fit on the map, but Spencer had still managed to circle the rough locations of the abductions with blue marker. 

“He’s been right so far,” JJ said. “How do we know that the unsub doesn’t live somewhere between here and Morgantown, and has some kind of personal connection with Bird’s Eye that makes him dump the bodies here?” 

“The ME estimated that the last wounds on the bodies were made less than a half-hour before they were dumped,” Rossi said. “Unless he’s mutilating them in his vehicle, which likely wouldn’t give him the space he needs, he can get them from his secondary location to the dump sites in that short of a time frame.” 

“The direction of the forest is far less densely populated than the rest of the area around Bird’s Eye, and what’s more is that the unsub does have a slight preference towards the side of town facing the forest. He’s picked three churches closer to the entrance to the forest over two that were closer to the highway.” Reid gestured to the map again. “The red circle links the churches; you can see it’s kind of lopsided. The black circle is my estimate of where he lives. I think that Bird’s Eye is probably still the most populated area close to him, and maybe his connection is just as simple as that.” It wasn’t a small area, and it covered a lot of dark green forest, but it was a start. 

No one had any time to respond, because in the next second the door opened and Morgan and Prentiss came inside, shaking snow off their coats. “Morgantown PD’s been briefed,” Morgan said, “and they’re increasing patrols during the night.” 

“We had a harder time trying to find anyone who saw the bodies being taken,” Emily continued, hanging her coat from the back of a chair and sitting down heavily. “A few people said they might have seen a dark-colored pickup truck, but that doesn’t exactly narrow things down.” 

“The areas where the unsub snatched people are all alleyways that aren’t even on the usual homeless circuit. It would have been easy for the unsub to grab them off the street. He just had to be able to carry up to, what, a buck 75 of dead weight, and that’s a lot but it’s not impossible, especially if he’s used to physical labor.” Morgan took his phone out of his pocket and squinted at the screen. “I got bars again, but we were totally dead almost the whole way between Morgantown and here, otherwise we would have called.” 

“Reid’s started a geographical profile for where the unsub lives, we don’t think it’s in town,” JJ said. 

Morgan whistled, taking in the evidence board. “That’s a lot of forest, kid.” 

“I know,” Reid said. “Can you ask Garcia to check-” 

“Property records,” Morgan nodded. “Got it.” His phone was already halfway to his ear, and Garcia must have picked up almost immediately. “Hey, baby girl, we need property records for the forest surrounding Bird’s Eye.” 

“Not a problem,” she replied, “but I gotta warn you guys, there’s stuff that doesn’t make any kind of record at all that I wouldn’t have access to. Hunting cabins, sheds, you can live a lot of places that pass under the radar.” 

“Like Marshall,” Reid realized. 

“What?” It was eerie how fast Hotch’s head shot up from out of the corner of Reid’s eye. 

“Um, the place that Tobias Hankel held me. Marshall. It wasn’t on any property records because his family had built it there.” Spencer cleared his throat; everyone was looking at him and he had the distinct desire to dive behind the bulletin board, so instead he changed the subject. “At least we don’t have to search the National Forest. It’s illegal to live on that land, plus that would create jurisdictional issues with the Rangers. Narrowing it down to non-federal areas helps significantly. Interestingly enough, Allegheny National Forest-” 

He found himself shutting his mouth abruptly at a touch from Hotch, light on his upper back, a gentle refocus, but for some reason, it made Spencer’s cheeks flush, made him break out into goosebumps. He wasn’t embarrassed, that was never why Hotch did that, they just needed to stay on task; nevertheless, he was red in the face, and he sat up a little straighter in his seat and tried not to think too hard about it. 

“As usual, 187 is right,” Garcia said. “That… really doesn’t help too much with the issues of off-record property, though. The digital dark ages always come back to bite us in the butt in this job.” Her scowl was audible. 

“Great.” Morgan laughed, humorlessly. “So we’ve got an unsub who might live somewhere that technically doesn’t exist, with no way to find him until he commits another crime.” 

“That’s not all we have,” Rossi said. 

“We’ve got a profile.” Hotch tossed his folder onto the table. “I think we’re ready. JJ, let the sheriff know; I’ll brief Morgan and Prentiss on what we have so far. Five minutes and we’ll meet in the bullpen.” 

“Yes, sir,” JJ nodded. 

“I’ll email you guys those records as soon as I get them back,” came Garcia’s voice from the speaker. “Can’t hurt, right?” 

“Thanks, baby,” Morgan said. When he closed his phone, the familiar silence settled over the team. Giving a profile meant they were one step closer to the end of the case, but that end wasn’t always good, and Reid still couldn’t shake the dread that had settled over him and thickened, like the snow blanketing the ground outside. 

* * *

“Our unsub, or unknown subject, is a male, likely aged 25 to 40. We know he has to be in good physical condition because he’s moving full-grown adult bodies regularly, and based on both statistics about offenders and the population here overall, he’s likely to be white.” The room was full of all of the deputies and officers that the town had, and Hotch’s voice carried all the way to the back. 

Morgan spoke up next. “This man is not someone who’s part of the fabric of this town. He doesn’t work an office job, and if he went to school, he didn’t graduate, or had an extremely poor attendance record. He likely lives somewhere in the forest, or not far from it. He’s a recluse, and he likes it that way. It’s probably all he knows. Think about seasonal workers, contractors, anyone who you might see on occasion but not really know.” 

“He’s religious, but he doesn’t go to any church in town,” JJ picked up from Morgan. “And he’s not a sociopath. He shows remorse for his crimes through his depositing of the bodies in graveyards. He might be socially awkward due to years of living in isolation, but he’s not incapable of relating to other people.” 

“And since we know that he’s not sociopathic, we believe he’s carrying out the crimes as some kind of compulsion,” Reid explained. “His mutilation of the bodies is highly ritualized, and it’s the same every time, but it’s not sexual in nature. This is more of an OCD-type compulsion, where he feels that he _has_ to complete a task in a certain way.” 

“What happens if he don’t do it?” a deputy sprawled in a chair wanted to know. 

“We’re not sure of the exact nature of the unsub’s compulsions,” Prentiss answered, crossing her arms. “What we do know is that these types of compulsions are rarely so easily satisfied. So far our unsub’s been lucky and has been able to keep his need fulfilled without killing. But if he has that compulsion again, which he will, and a body isn’t ready, the compulsion will win.” 

“And that’s when this unsub turns from a bodysnatcher into a killer,” Rossi said. 

“This type of unsub is likely not following the news very closely, if at all,” Hotch said. “He’s extremely internally driven, and others’ reactions don’t matter much to him. He lives by his own twisted set of rules and morals, and the real world no longer affects those.” 

“He’s got enough experience to know how to drain the blood from a body, but he doesn’t have a medical background,” Reid added, and tapped the pictures of the last body. “He was efficient, but not surgically precise. He probably has hunting experience.” 

“So we’re looking for every woodsy weirdo outside the town limits,” the same deputy said. “Great.” 

“Not exactly,” Rossi stepped in. “Any encounter with this unsub will be different. He won’t-” 

It wasn’t even so much the _bang_ of the door slamming open as it was the gust of cold, snowy wind that made everyone in the room look towards the back, where a woman with mousy brown hair stood in the doorway, anxiously twisting her hands. “Sheriff, I’m real sorry for interrupting,” she said. “It’s just, Larry went out today to check his traps in the forest and he hasn’t come back yet.” 

“Well, when did he leave, Ruth?” the sheriff asked, rising to his feet and taking his hat off, deeply-ingrained manners coming to the surface. 

“At least five hours ago,” she managed to get out, then broke into a sob. “I didn’t — I couldn’t even drive past any of the churches in town, I was so worried I’d see-” 

She sank to the floor right there, on the muddy welcome mat at the door, and as JJ rushed over to her, Spencer felt his stomach drop horribly. His mouth went dry, and when he looked over at the rest of the team, they met his eyes with the same knowledge he had: if there even was a point in counting down at all, if this man was still alive, they had less than a day to keep it that way.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for checking in to read the second chapter!
> 
> i have a playlist for this fic that i wanted to share. you can find it [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2NX1zDH1BUan6lSjhKucAC?si=925d234cf757437d) \-- this is for the first two parts, and then i'll add the rest of it when the final chapter goes up. i've been listening to it non-stop, while writing and also just, like, going about my life lol. feel free to take a listen! it's made up of songs that i feel match either the plot, the characters/relationships, or just the Vibes of the fic.
> 
> without further ado...

“He’s smart and experienced.” Ruth wiped her face again, but didn’t refuse the tissue that Emily offered her. “We’ve lived here our whole lives, he wouldn’t — he _couldn’t_ get lost. He goes hunting every weekend, he knows the forest.”

“Would he have had a gun with him when he went to check his traps?” Morgan asked. They were all sitting around a table in the conference room that wasn’t occupied by the rest of the evidence. 

“No, he wouldn’t. He didn’t have enough time to really hunt today,” Ruth sniffed. “We were supposed to go to the night service at church tonight, he promised me he’d be home before dinner. That’s when I got worried.” 

“Mrs. Thatcher, do you two have any children, anyone else who needs to be notified?” JJ reached across the table to touch Ruth’s hand gently. 

“Our children are grown now, neither of them live here anymore.” She dabbed at her eyes, obviously trying to stem the flow of tears. “They were the ones who convinced me to come in in the first place, I thought… I thought that if I didn’t come in then it wouldn’t be real.” 

JJ nodded and paused, then said, without taking her hand away, “I’m sorry to have to ask you this, but... the other victims had drug problems. Did Larry ever struggle with addiction?” 

“No,” Ruth said vehemently, shaking her head. “He didn’t. He never even took the pills they gave him after he threw his back out three years ago.” 

Reid’s phone rang, making everyone jump, and Ruth’s sobbing breathing hitch loudly in surprise. “I’m sorry. Excuse me,” he said, and ducked out of the room and back into the buzz of the bullpen. “Emily?” 

“We found her husband’s car at the edge of the woods where she said it would probably be,” came the tinny reply. “There are tracks into the forest. We didn’t go too far in. I think we’re gonna need a search party, and sooner rather than later. The trees are helping keep the snow cover to a minimum, but it’s gonna get dark, and then…” 

The ending of the sentence wasn’t necessary; given the accelerated timeline that the unsub was displaying, it wasn’t likely that Ruth’s husband would survive the night, if he had made it so far. 

“Got it. I’ll let them know,” Reid said. 

“Oh, um, Hotch wants to say something,” Emily said, sounding surprised, and the line went fuzzy for a second. 

When it cleared up again, it was Hotch’s voice coming through the phone. “Reid.” 

“Yeah.” 

“I don’t think that Mrs. Thatcher should be part of the search expedition. See what she can give us about her husband’s usual patterns from the station, but don’t bring her. Considering that this unsub doesn’t torture his victims, and all of the mutilation is done postmortem…” 

“I’ll have JJ stay here with her,” Reid said. 

“I’d prefer it if you stayed, too.” 

The first impulse Reid had was to laugh. “You’re not serious, are you?” 

“I am,” came the calm reply. 

“I — Hotch, we need every person we can find out there, and I know the geographical profile, the whole profile, actually, just as well as anyone does.” 

“I think you’re letting two profiles blur together.” The background chatter of other deputies faded; Hotch must have stepped away from the group. 

Reid felt all of the breath stop solid in his chest. “What do you mean, who’s the other one?” Feigning innocence was all he could think to do with the sharp stab of indignation. 

“Spencer, you know what I’m talking about.” 

“Oh, I know. I just want to hear you say it.” It was almost scary how Spencer could hear his own voice getting more and more venomous and be able to do absolutely nothing to stop it. “Because I don’t need to be treated-” 

“I’m not treating you any differently than I would treat any other member of this team who had been through the same thing.” 

“Then trust my instincts,” Spencer said, and licked his lips, “and let me do my job.” 

Even though he was angry, the silent beat that followed still made his heart drop into his stomach. “I’ll see you here ASAP,” Hotch finally said, and then the line went dead. 

There wasn’t time to try and dissect the meaning behind the toneless reply. Instead, Spencer folded his phone and put it back in his pocket. “Sheriff,” he said, and the man appeared at the door. “Agent Hotchner wants us to set up a search party with as many deputies as you can spare. Is there anyone in town who might be able to help us track Mr. Thatcher’s movements through the woods, at least for a while? He did go into the forest on his own, at first.” 

“Well, shit, I could do that,” Ulrich said. “Especially with the snow, if we can get there fast enough, it shouldn’t be too hard to see where he went.” 

“Then we should go as fast as we can. Have whoever stays here stay with Mrs. Thatcher, that way she can help us. Agent Jareau can stay behind too.” 

“I’ll gather the boys,” the sheriff nodded. For a moment, he made like he was going to walk away, then hesitated. “Do you… Dr. Reid, what do you think the likelihood is we come back with him alive?” 

This part was always tricky, balancing being truthful with keeping people hopeful, and Reid paused before he answered. “It’s hard to say, because this unsub doesn’t have a defined killing pattern. We only know how he treats bodies that are already dead.” 

“Right. Two nights.” Ulrich pressed his lips into a thin line. “I just mean, is this a manhunt or are we looking for a body?” 

“As of right now, we have no reason to think that Mr. Thatcher isn’t alive,” Spencer said softly. “With this kind of thing, it’s always in our best interest to act like the victim is living, unless we find evidence to the contrary.” 

“Of course. You’re right.” The sheriff closed his eyes for a second, frowned so quickly anyone else might have missed it. “You’re right.” 

“But the faster we’re able to get out there, the better chances he has.” 

“I’m on it,” Ulrich said, and when he put his hat on, he had an air of resigned acceptance, despite what Spencer had said, like he understood everything that was going on even though they’d tried to cover the truth with optimism, like he was already prepared to dig another grave tonight. 

* * *

The drive to the foot of the forest where Larry Thatcher had gone missing was mostly on gravelly, hilly backroads, and it didn’t help the sick feeling that was eating up the pit of Reid’s stomach. Morgan drove, and when they arrived, he barely got his seatbelt undone before he was on the ground and walking over to Hotch, who was directing the small but swarming crowd. Reid followed suit, strapping his vest a little tighter just to give his hands something to do while he tried to steady them. 

“We’ve got less than two hours until full dark,” the sheriff said. “If we want to find him, we have to get going. I’ll lead, as far as I can, and y’all can fan out beside me, call for him.” 

“We can’t lose anyone else,” Emily said. Her face was flushed from the cold, spots of red on her cheeks above her scarf. “However far we go, we have to be able to get everyone back before it’s dark.” 

“Stay close to each other and don’t go too far from the path,” Morgan was calling, over the heads of everyone, standing up the slope of the hill. “If you think you found something, blow your whistle.” 

No one really started the movement towards the mouth of the forest; everyone just seemed to file along at once, narrowing from a wide group into a steady stream of twos and threes, a single bloodhound in the front with its nose practically glued to the ground. Beside Reid, Emily fell into step as they crossed from grass onto the dirt-packed path, and it got even darker than it already was. She clicked her flashlight on, and it joined the parade of other beams, criss-crossing through the forest, sluicing on the floor, hitting trees two feet from them only to disappear into the depths in between the trunks. It was strange, the way that the branches kept so much light out even though they were bare of leaves, like they were knitted together above the heads of the little people wandering beneath them. 

Amid the calling of the rest of the party, Emily cleared her throat. “Reid…” 

“I know that tone,” he said, kept his voice fairly neutral, but was battling the instinct to either roll his eyes or snap at her. That wasn’t fair. 

“I’m not gonna pry, you just seem…” She sighed and clicked her tongue. “I don’t know. Off.” 

“What do you mean?” Spencer made a point to not look at her, instead turning his own flashlight on and starting to sweep, methodically, as if he were dusting before his feet. 

“You haven’t given me any fun facts about any part of the case.” 

“It’s not fun,” he said sharply, sharper than he meant to. It was like a sucker punch at a bruise, every time he thought about this case, and he thought that maybe Hotch was right and he was seeing parallels that weren’t there, but that didn’t change how it felt. It made him want to curl in on himself, cover up the parts that were raw and too tender for the light, but he couldn’t; there was nowhere to hide. 

“Well, of course it’s not, I…” Emily trailed off and shook her head. “Sorry. Forget it.” 

They walked in silence for a few seconds, swinging their flashlights back and forth. The sudden hurt faded as quickly as it came, replaced by the acidity of embarrassment on the back of Spencer’s tongue. Emily was calling out for Larry, had stepped a few feet off the path, so Spencer waited a few seconds before offering, “You know, the Appalachian mountains are hundreds of millions of years old, 480, to be precise. They were formed during the Ordovician Period, and when they first appeared, they were at the center of Pangea, and were as tall as the Alps or the Rockies.” He scuffed his shoe and hit something more solid than dirt, a rock beneath his toe, the feeling satisfying, a reminder of the realness of his surroundings, something to pull him out of his head. 

Emily didn’t have to turn her head from peering up the side of the hill; Spencer could hear in her voice that she was smiling. “Yeah?” 

“They’ve been eroded to almost nothing and brought back up again.” He walked a few feet in the other direction, catching a few straggly plants that survived the cold in his beam, sticking up from under the thin layer of snow that made it through the tree cover. “It’s funny, people don’t really think about these mountains other than… poverty, I guess, but the land we’re standing on is older than the dinosaurs, or even some forms of life. It’s older than everything else around us.” Reid paused and looked up, saw a few stars winking their way into existence, around the gaps in the clouds, bright through the thinly falling flurries. “They’re not the tallest mountains anymore, so I guess people care less.” 

When he took his next step, he wasn’t watching where he was going, and his shoe slipped on something under the snow. For a second everything was unsure, and that same gut-panic he’d felt in all his dreams took over, seizing him up inside. He heard a short noise, halfway between a yelp and a scream, and assumed it came from his own mouth, but he couldn’t be sure until he caught his footing again and stood there panting, trying to calm his hammering heart. 

“Reid?” Loud, crunching footsteps behind him told him that Emily had caught up, so her hand on his shoulder didn’t make him jump out of his skin like it might have if he didn’t hear her. 

“I’m okay, I just slipped,” he said, or started to say, but it caught in his throat, because with Emily had come her light, and it lit up the place where Reid had lost his balance, turning the sneaker-mark and slick of mud from the dully-lit grey of the natural five PM light into stark crimson-brown. 

They traded a look, one that they were both used to but that Spencer could never describe in words, and then Emily stepped carefully forwards and slipped on a blue glove from her pocket and brushed away more snow. All of the dirt that she could reach was wet with the blood, shining under the layer of soft white. 

“It’s not fresh,” she said, as close to a hope as they had. 

“Hotch,” Spencer called over his shoulder, trying not to paw the blood off the bottom of his shoe like a nervous horse. 

“Got something?” He appeared on the path a few feet below them. 

“Yeah, we got a lot of blood,” Emily responded. “Not new, it’s under the snow.” 

The deputy with the dog led the others up to where Emily and Reid stood, and as soon as the bloodhound got the scent, it pulled them all a few yards up the mountainside and started to rove around, stumbling over roots and buried rocks. It felt like forever, but realistically, it was probably only a few minutes until the dog stopped short and circled the base of a tree, whining and digging. Morgan knelt down and shone his flashlight, then beckoned to Spencer. “Kid, c’mere, brush that off.” 

There was what looked like earth built up in front of the tree in a small pile, lumped under the layer of white. If Spencer had learned anything from this job, it was that if things could get worse, they almost always would, so he steeled himself as he crouched down beside Morgan, snapping his gloves on, and started to dust off the snow. It gave way to black powder, then burnt chunks of charcoaled wood, coated in ash, and not even the awful knowledge of what they’d probably find could stop Reid from finishing the job. 

At the very bottom of the makeshift fire were a few crumpled, shrunken objects. Anyone else might look at them, the ash on their surface, the blackened edges, and think they were just more wood, but for better or for worse, Spencer had seen this kind of thing before, and he gathered them as gently in his palm as he could when he picked them up. 

“Jesus,” Morgan said, and turned away. 

“Is that…” the sheriff got out, his voice thick, his eyes wide even in the faltering light. 

“Yes,” Hotch said, closing his eyes. 

There was something else on the tree, carved into its trunk higher up, nearly covered by the blackening from the fire’s smoke. Spencer stood carefully, leaned in as much as he could, and, with his other hand, rubbed the staining away. 

It was a cross, staring him in the face, right at eye level, and that sight was like a key, like the answer he’d been looking for. Images spun through his brain almost faster than he could keep up: an altar, a censer trailing smoke, an empty needle, the flaking gilt lettering of an old Bible, a gun pointed level with his eyes, the barrel darker than pitch. 

One by one, they looked at each other, the understanding passing between them. 

“What in God’s name,” Ulrich said. It sounded hollow to say that, here in this Godless place, despite being under the sign of the cross. 

“‘An altar of Earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings,’” Reid quoted numbly. 

“Exodus,” Hotch said from Ulrich’s side. 

“Chapter 20, verse 24,” Reid said. He realized he was still holding the burnt remnants of the body they’d found, and looked down at his palm, almost confused. It seemed so far away. 

“Here,” Prentiss said, opening an evidence bag from her pocket. “Here, Reid, give those to me.” 

“Yeah, okay,” he heard himself saying, opened his hand and let them fall to the bottom of the bag. Everything seemed to be going in slow motion; even the snowflakes were falling at half-speed, like they were being caught in camera flashes. 

“Let’s go,” he could hear Hotch saying. “As soon as we’re out of the woods, we need crime scene tech here. Sheriff, you and two of your deputies stay here, so they don’t get lost. We’ll go back to the station, add what we can to the profile and give this to the ME.” 

Then there was a hand on Spencer’s elbow that he hadn’t expected, and it took a second for him to register its presence; he jumped, but probably a second too late, he thought. “It’s me,” Hotch said quietly. “We’re leaving, come on.” 

“But the crime scene,” Reid said numbly. “It’s still there, it’s never gonna be that fresh again-” 

“Rossi and Prentiss and Morgan can take care of the crime scene,” Hotch said. “You’re white as a sheet, I want you out of here.” 

“I’m fine,” Spencer protested as Hotch kept walking him along. They were back on the path now, the mouth of the trail and the open field beyond visible. He tried half-heartedly to dig his feet in, but the path was too slick, and he just slid along. 

“You’re not,” Hotch said, and there was no mistaking the exasperation in his voice, even over the ringing in Spencer’s ears. 

It got easier to breathe the second they passed outside the tree line, and Spencer knew that was inside his head, but nevertheless, it felt better the farther away they got, until they were standing among the cluster of cars parked haphazardly on the ground. Larry Thatcher’s pickup was on the other side; no one parked near him, like abduction was contagious. Reid pulled away from Hotch and turned his back and took a few shaky gasps, looking down at his feet, the ground beneath them, hard and frozen in clumps under the snow. With fumbling fingers he pulled off the blue gloves and shoved them in his pocket. 

Small mercies meant that Hotch hadn’t said anything since they’d made it out, was just staring out at the forest, as a few other people came streaming out of it. He looked the same as he always did, which was making Spencer a little crazy, because here he was, breaking down over something he should be used to by now, after almost five years with the BAU, and Hotch was just… himself. “Why do I feel like this?” he asked, quietly, before he could stop himself. 

“You don’t need me to tell you that,” Hotch said. He didn’t even glance over, like he’d been expecting to hear it. 

“If I can’t — if this is making me feel like it does,” Spencer said, “then how can I do this job?” 

Something about that second question, though, made Hotch turn towards him. “I would be more worried if you weren’t affected.” 

“But no one else is,” Reid said. “I’m the only one, Hotch, it’s just me.” His eyes were stinging. 

“You’re also the only one who had a personal stake in a case like this.” Hotch raised an eyebrow at him. “Reid, you can’t expect yourself to not react. You’re human.” 

“Yeah.” They both stood there for a few seconds, and even though the initial fear reaction was fading — Spencer could imagine the chemicals in his blood receding — he still felt like a burned-out shell, shockingly hollow. “Sometimes I wish I wasn’t,” he blurted. 

“Don’t say that.” The reply was sudden and sharp, and Reid watched as Hotch’s face changed into something he hardly knew. 

“Why? It’s true.” Spencer laughed without mirth. “I mean, I wish I could react like you, you see this day in and day out and I’ve never once seen you-” 

“Spencer, just because I don’t show it doesn’t mean that I don’t feel it,” Hotch interrupted roughly. 

“Well, then teach me how to not show it,” Spencer pleaded, “because I can’t stand it, Hotch, I can’t.” He could feel the desperation urging his voice higher, and some small part of him felt ridiculous, looking down on the situation; a skinny nearly-30-year-old holding back tears in a West Virginia field, a gun on his hip and an FBI badge in his wallet and what felt like a yawning emptiness inside him, pitching down forever, growing wider by the minute. 

“I can’t,” Hotch said, and it was quiet, so much so that the only reason Spencer knew he spoke was the visible puff of air from his mouth. “It’s not something you can learn, Spencer, I’m sorry. In the academy, they teach you… they desensitize you to the sounds of torture. They make you able to hardly flinch at the sight of a crushed hand, or a ruined eye, or a body so mangled it’s nearly unrecognizable. But no one knows better than this team that you can’t undo what’s been done to you. Feeling something, or experiencing it, is always going to affect you. And I’m sorry that I can’t take that away.” 

Spencer nodded. His throat was tight, and the cold air hurt when it forced its way into his lungs. “So should I just quit, I mean, can I not do this anymore?” 

“ _No,_ ” Hotch replied, with enough force to make Reid look. “You just have to ride it out. And it gets easier day by day. And I know that patience is the last thing you feel like you have right now.” He took a step closer and reached out his hand, and Spencer was surprised by the fact that his first instinct was to take it, until he saw that Hotch had his wallet resting in his palm and he snapped his own hand back, as fast as he could, shame trickling down around his ears as he leaned closer. 

The wallet was lying open to a picture of the team. It was some event that Strauss had insisted they get photographed for, maybe a Bureau newsletter or something. It must have been before Rossi joined the team again, because they were all there as one but him: Morgan stood in the center, his hand on Garcia’s shoulder; JJ was right next to her, and behind JJ was Prentiss. Spencer saw himself in the back, above Gideon, his glasses catching the camera flash, and between him and Prentiss stood Hotch, beaming for one occasion and not even trying to hide it. 

“Do you know why I keep this in my wallet?” Hotch said. He was close enough now that Spencer could feel his body heat. 

“Because keeping a picture of Haley and Jack would put them in danger?” 

Hotch let out a huff that was halfway to being a laugh. “That’s true, but it’s not why I keep a picture of the team. Every time I think that I can’t keep going, every time I’m tempted to do what Gideon did, I think about all of the times that we’ve pushed through things I never thought we could. How Morgan confronted his childhood abuser, and put him behind bars. How Elle fought tooth and nail for her health and her sanity. How Garcia keeps us informed every day at the expense of her own comfort. Even Gideon’s choice took bravery, to leave what he knew completely. And I think about you, Spencer,” he said, and for some reason that made Spencer’s breath catch in his chest. “Holding on to anything you could to save us.” 

“You make it sound so… I don’t know. Heroic,” Reid said. He touched his own face in the picture; he hadn’t been through that, yet, and he wondered if it was his imagination or if he really looked less worried, less burdened. 

“It doesn’t have to be that, if you don’t want it to.” Hotch closed the wallet and slipped it away again. “What I’m trying to say is that you’re not alone.” 

“Everyone likes to say that.” Spencer jammed his hands in his pockets. “I just — I’m sorry, it doesn’t change how I feel.” 

The light was almost totally gone from the sky now. “I know it doesn’t,” Hotch said. “You asked me. So I told you.” This time when he reached out, his hand was empty, and he touched Spencer’s back, between his shoulder blades. 

There was a brief second where Spencer felt something he didn’t know how to put into words, where for a moment his chest didn’t just feel empty but like someday, it might be full again, like it had potential instead of just a lack of light inside. It was so powerful that it almost knocked the wind out of him, and he couldn’t think of anything at all to say, his tongue useless inside his mouth, like his hands hanging limply at his sides. 

Then his phone rang, the harsh sound of beeping jolting him out of his reverie. He fumbled with getting it out, his fingers clumsy with the cold, then picked up. “Hello?” 

Hotch’s hand slid away again and Spencer could swear it got ten degrees colder. 

“Hey, Spence, any news?” JJ sounded anxious on the phone, and tired, like they all were. 

“Yeah. We found some blood spilled about ten feet off the path. It’s not Larry Thatcher, it’s old, under the snow, but we followed it and found some kind of altar and some burnt remains.” 

JJ swore under her breath. “From the other bodies?” 

“Looks that way.” 

“So no news on Mr. Thatcher.” 

“No, sorry.” 

When they delivered the same news to Mrs. Thatcher in person, fifteen minutes later, she took it fairly well, all things considered, just pressed her lips together until they practically turned white. Even though JJ reached out to her, she shrugged it away and walked outside, leaving her coat draped over the back of her chair. It was the same instinct Reid had seen in plenty of other people who experienced what she was going through, hoping that the cold could shock you out of the awfulness, but unfortunately it didn’t work like that, or at least it hadn’t in his experience. Even if it took for a while, things always came creeping back. 

“You think the unsub is making sacrifices?” JJ asked, almost a whisper, even though Mrs. Thatcher was out of earshot; Reid could see the bright red cherry of a cigarette glowing outside the window, the darkness so thick now that it didn’t even illuminate her face. 

“There’s not really another reason you burn a body under a cross,” Morgan said, dropping heavily into a seat across from them. 

“The body was almost completely exsanguinated, that had to have been as much blood as the unsub could have possibly drained out of it.” Reid scraped the bottom of his shoe against the worn carpet again; it still felt sticky, tainted. “And he tried to burn the entrails, too.” 

“Why didn’t he succeed?” JJ looked nauseous, but didn’t lean away. Morgan’s phone rang, and he flipped it open and greeted Garcia quietly, leaving time for Spencer to respond. 

“The fire wasn’t hot enough,” he said. “The human body has an extremely high water content. It takes well over an hour for the process of cremation in a furnace to take place, and that’s with artificially high temperatures ranging from 1,400 to 1,800 degrees; the average campfire is only 900, and it’s likely that even if he got it to burn hotter by stacking up the wood and building up a sort of homemade furnace, he couldn’t keep it going for long enough to completely burn all of the organs.” 

“You’re just a fountain of joy, aren’t you, honey,” Garcia said through the speakerphone. 

“More of a fountain of truth, I think,” Reid mused with somewhat unexpected relief. Hearing Garcia’s voice was so weirdly comforting. Now of all times, when he felt like the world was teetering around on its axis, and she was still there, it filled him up like something physical and warmed him to the tips of his ears. “What do you have for us?” 

“I’ve been a busy bee while you guys were in the forest, but not a particularly productive one,” she said, keyboards clacking in a perennial metronome under her voice. “Hotch asked me to look for any similar crimes within the past 30 years-” 

As if she’d summoned him, Hotch walked into the room, smelling like cigarette smoke; he must have been outside talking over the scene with the deputies. “What did you find, Garcia?” 

“Oh, hi, sir. Well, I was just about to say that I unfortunately have zilch. No other bodies winding up in churchyards.” 

“It’s unlikely this unsub would have struck in a different state or anything else that wouldn’t show up on your search.” Morgan set the phone down in the middle of the table and they all leaned closer to it instinctively. “He knows this area too well, he’s too comfortable in these forests. He has to be from here, and being a wanderer wouldn’t fit the profile at all.” 

“I agree, and also I did a cursory search in the surrounding states just to be sure. No found bodies, very few disembowelments, and none of the ones that pinged also included… well, completely draining the blood from the body, either.” 

“There are several different types of burnt offerings you can make that are described in the Bible,” Spencer cut in, folding his arms on the table. “But pretty much all of them talk about lambs, sheep, cows, farm animals, explicitly. It’s possible that our unsub started this delusion on the letter of the word and escalated more and more.” 

“It fits with killing in general, it’s part of the trio,” Morgan said. 

“Well, partially, but he wouldn’t be torturing them on purpose. It’s likely that the remains wouldn’t be found, or if someone did, they’d assume it was an animal instead.” 

“Garcia, will you check into reports of missing livestock in the area in the past year?” Hotch asked. 

“My fingers are already typing,” she replied. “Catch you on the other side of this query.” 

“Bye, mama,” Morgan called, and snapped his phone shut. 

The door opened again and let in another chill, Emily and Rossi on its heels. “We need to think of other ways to find this unsub,” Emily said, sniffing, her eyes bright and wet from the cold. “There’s not a lot we can do with all that forest out there, and he’s not leaving any forensic evidence.” 

“We’ve got Garcia on possible priors.” Hotch walked over to the evidence boards and scanned them again. “Do you have any other ideas?” 

“We could ask at school,” JJ offered. “I know we profiled it would be unlikely that the unsub graduated, but he probably went at first, right?” 

“It’s hard to avoid sending your children to school without homeschooling them, and true homeschooling isn’t likely to have occurred in the kind of isolated and probably abusively religious environment that our unsub was raised in,” Emily added, then pulled her hat off, her hair frizzy for the first time Reid could remember. “God, it’s freezing out there.” 

“There’s a hotel across the street that we’ll be staying at,” JJ said half-apologetically. 

Unraveling his scarf, Rossi sat down, snow falling from his coat to the floor. “Some good things about small towns; you never have to go very far.” 

“We should have dinner,” Morgan suggested. “We’ve been out in the cold, we’ve been up for what, 12 hours now? Some of us longer.” Spencer felt his eyes cut over to him, and pointedly ignored it, instead just pulled his legs up underneath him and pored over the files extra hard. 

“Who wants pizza?” Emily leaned back in her chair until it groaned under the stress. 

“We had pizza last week. Let’s have Chinese,” JJ argued. “I want to eat something green.” 

“I don’t want Chinese _or_ pizza in West Virginia,” Rossi interjected, his face transforming into the same look Reid had seen him bearing one time when he’d accidentally washed a silk shirt on high in the washing machine. “Let’s just get burgers and fries.” 

“I’ll call,” Morgan said, and snatched his phone off the table before anyone could protest. 

The rest of the team was hot on his heels, but the food was the last thing on Spencer’s mind. Usually it didn’t bother him much, but the thought of a burger, red juice dripping out, just clashed in his mind with the blood in the dirt on the mountainside, and made his stomach turn, queasy and sick. Instead, he slid his chair around the table, to the side that was mostly empty and reached for a pad and a Sharpie. 

Beside him, he heard wheels rolling on the carpet, then smelled Emily’s shampoo. “What are you doing?” 

“I’m going to make a list of some of the different Bible verses that talk about sacrifice. I think it might help us understand the unsub’s delusions, and maybe even predict what his endgame is.” 

“Okay.” She glanced over at him and raised her eyebrows. “Do you have any ideas so far?” 

“I’ll be better informed when I see it all on paper,” Spencer said, tracing the lines of the legal pad idly with the capped marker. “But… well, when we think of sacrifice in a religious sense, it’s usually either for penance or to make something happen. I think it has to be tied to the stressor for the unsub; if things hadn’t gotten so bad for him, he wouldn’t feel the need to do this.” 

“So what happened to him that he wants to stop or undo?” Prentiss got up and leaned her hip on the table, so she was facing Reid. 

“Or what did he do that he thinks he needs to confess?” More memories, unbidden, the smack of pain on the sole of his foot, a roaring low voice. That sort of fear-based belief, that unwavering commitment to a complete hell of a world, was enough to drive anyone out of their mind. 

“You mean repent for?” The slip hadn’t escaped Emily’s attention; she tilted her head to the side, reminiscent of what Reid had seen in pictures of birds of prey. 

“Mm-hm,” he said, as casually as he could manage, and practically held his breath until she gave up staring at the back of his head, pushed off the table and walked over to Morgan instead. 

The parallels were there, Reid knew that logically, even separate from his own experiences, but nevertheless, the sense of shame for recognizing them was as strong as the inability to ignore them. It was the same sensation as touching a wound; he _knew_ it was going to hurt but he couldn’t stop himself. 

Distraction was the best option, especially because he felt his eyelids starting to grow heavy and it was only just 7 PM. Sinking into facts, verses he could recall, was comfortable and easy and nothing that put him out of his depth, and that’s exactly what he wanted. He started to recall different passages, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, all of the books that most modern people never bothered to read, and before long he had a few pages full of instructions for sacrifices and a sketched-out picture of the kind of desperation mixed with delusion that always boded badly for a case. A person who would follow these rules, after all of the religious arguments over validity, after the thousands of years between their writing and today, had to be willing, able, and in enough pain to suspend reality. 

“That’s a poignant way to phrase it,” Rossi said, and Reid jumped. 

“I didn’t realize I was talking out loud.” 

“More mumbling than anything.” He was holding a box of food, and bit into what looked like a roast beef sandwich. “Dinner’s here.” 

“I didn’t order, I’m not really hungry,” Reid murmured. 

“Emily ordered something for you.” Rossi raised a single eyebrow at him. “That big brain of yours runs on calories, Reid. I’m not a scientist, but even I know that.” 

For a moment, Spencer considered arguing, but he was too exhausted to do it, so he pushed his chair back from the table and stood up; he’d had his legs crossed on the seat of the chair, and they had fallen asleep at some point, all pins-and-needles under his slacks. He walked on them over to where the rest of the team sat, in the other room, feeling bizarrely like a baby deer. 

“Hey,” Emily said around her mouthful of turkey burger. “I got you some chicken if you want it.” They were all sitting on the police break room couches, and though the design of the fabric, the feel of the carpet was different, this was a scene Reid knew well. 

Rossi’s pointed gaze was clear even if Reid couldn’t see him directly, so Spencer cleared his throat and took a seat next to Morgan on a plaid-upholstered sofa. “Thanks.” It didn’t make him sick to look at, like he had expected, and even he wasn’t immune to the smell of fried food; he figured at this point it would be easier to just go ahead and eat, and it might keep people off his back, too. He grabbed a fork and took a bite of a tender, and it wasn’t bad at all, didn’t turn grey and tasteless in his mouth like food sometimes did on a case. 

“No talking about the body or the crime scene or anything while we’re eating, please,” JJ said preemptively. 

“I wasn’t going to,” Reid got out around his food. 

“I could hear you thinking about it,” she said, raising her eyebrows. 

“No you couldn’t, that’s a physical impossibility.” 

“So you were thinking about it?” Morgan asked. He had ketchup on his nose, somehow. 

“Well, of course I was thinking about it, it’s our case. But I was really thinking more about the religious aspect of things.” 

“Pretty cut-and-dry, isn’t it?” Rossi wiped his hands on the napkin tucked into his collar. 

“Not really. Like I said earlier, there’s a few different forms of animal sacrifice described in the Bible, ranging from simply killing the animal and then using its body in a feast to burning it in its entirety. Our unsub seems to be combining multiple elements of different kinds of offerings, it’s hard to track based off of that.” 

“We profiled him as being secluded, and whatever his stressor was, it’s probably made him desperate,” Morgan said. “If he’s detached enough to think killing people is gonna earn him favor with God, he’s not gonna be worrying about the exact mechanics anymore. There’s no kind of Christianity that approves human sacrifice.” 

“There’s the binding of Isaac,” Emily pointed out. 

“Yeah, but the point of that was that it was a test, God didn’t actually expect Abraham to sacrifice his son.” 

“Just to be prepared to do it. Devoted enough to do it.” She paused for a second and bit into a fry. “So our unsub wants to go a step beyond that.” 

“Did you find out anything else, Reid?” Hotch asked. He’d already finished his dinner and put the box in the trash, but true to JJ’s request, the files stayed closed. 

“I think I may have figured out why he was targeting drug overdoses at first.” Spencer shifted forwards and sat his food down on his lap so he could gesture. Many of the sacrifices specify that the animal should be unblemished. There wouldn’t be any external damage to the body from drug use except for needle marks in some cases, and even then they’d be small.” 

“But wait, wait.” Emily sat up a little straighter, closing her takeout box. “Aren’t most of these technically only applicable in Jewish theology? I mean, it’s all Old Testament stuff.” 

“Are you kidding? Religious zealots love the Old Testament,” Rossi said. “New covenant or not, it provides opportunities for power and control, and they can’t pass that up.” 

“Taking elements of the Bible out of context is pretty much necessary at this point given how much the world has changed since it’s been written.” Spencer shrugged and took another bite. “It really just depends which parts people choose to focus on, and that often says a lot more about them than they think.” 

“Look at the American evangelical movement’s focus on homosexuality,” JJ said. Her elbow bumped against Spencer’s, and he glanced over to see she was shredding a napkin. 

“So our unsub starts out by taking bodies and burning the parts that are most commonly used for offerings.” As Morgan spoke, twirling his pen between his fingers, Spencer tucked his legs up and reached in the box for another fry, surprised to find that it was almost empty. “He doesn’t want to kill people himself yet.” 

“But it’s not working, whatever he’s trying to change,” Emily filled in. “So now he’s escalating.” 

“We have to continue this investigation under the idea that Larry Thatcher is alive,” Hotch said, and looked out the window instinctively, even though Mrs. Thatcher’s car had left a half-hour ago, Reid had heard her pulling out of the parking lot. “But based on what we’ve profiled about this unsub, if he’s worked up the courage to kill, it’s likely that he’s dead already.” 

Dinners with the team always seemed to end in sober silence, no matter how genial the atmosphere at the beginning. Sometimes, Spencer was very tired of the “nature of the job.” 

Eventually, it was broken by a ringing phone — Morgan’s, and he turned it on and sat it in the middle of the table. “Hey, baby girl, you’re on speaker.” 

“Don’t worry, I’ll be good, I promise,” she said. “So I looked into reports of livestock theft and also got in touch with Animal Control to see if they’d found any mutilated bodies or anything, and get this: five animals missing from local farms from late October through November. Three different farms missing a lamb, two goats, and two sheep.” 

“Did they find the bodies?” Hotch spoke up. 

“Um, yes, but not until they’d already been gotten to by animals. I will spare you the images, but if any of you were thinking of going vegetarian, well, they’d be enough to convince you. Even despite the damage, though, the Animal Control officer said that they had no blood or internal organs left in their bodies.” 

“It’s gotta be him,” Emily said. 

“Garcia, did you find anyone with prior offenses similar to the nature of the case? Cruelty to animals, anything like that?” 

“Again, depressingly, there are a _lot_ of animal cruelty charges around here. People do not treat their hunting dogs well, and they treat the animals that they hunt even worse.” 

“I really just don’t think the unsub would have those kinds of offenses,” Reid mused. “He doesn’t want the animals to suffer, he’s not a sadist or a sociopath, according to the profile. They’re a means to an end, and if he kills them like he’s treated the bodies, he does it quickly and efficiently.” 

“Well, it was worth a shot, but Garcia’s right, that’s too wide of a net.” Hotch paused, then sat forward slightly, resting his elbows on his knees. “Can you look into children who dropped out of the school system in the last 20 years? The younger the better, and it would be in this district specifically.” 

“List of dropouts coming imminently,” she confirmed. 

“Check for kids who just didn’t register again, either,” Emily suggested. “Maybe compare class registration lists from year to year.” 

“Okay, but just so you know, that’s gonna be a long list,” Garcia warned over the sound of typing. “Just from a few minutes of Googling, it looks like the high school alone is over 2,000 kids, covers a frankly ridiculous amount of land.” 

“You can narrow it by ruling out anyone who lives within two miles of downtown,” Reid said. 

“Whatever you can get will be good. We can ask around town if you find anyone who fits the profile. Teachers might remember him; he’d have been withdrawn, socially anxious, wouldn’t have played well with others.” Hotch stood up from his chair and started to pace, slowly, back and forth. 

“I’ll do my best,” she promised. 

“If you can get us the list by morning, that would be excellent.” 

The keys went quiet for a moment. “Are we calling it a night?” 

“There’s not much more we can do tonight. It’s too dark and cold to search, we’d be putting more people in danger by doing that.” 

“Okay. Um, I will make that happen for you. It’ll be in your email before you get up.” 

“Thank you, Garcia.” 

“Yes, sir,” she said, uncharacteristically serious, and then there was the soft _click_ of her hanging up. 

In his steps, Hotch stilled and looked out at them. “I meant what I said; I know it’s still fairly early, but we’re all exhausted, and there’s nothing more we can do tonight.” 

“The waiting game is near the top of the list of my least favorite things about this job,” Rossi said, gathering his coat and clearing the remainder of his trash from the table. 

“I know we all wish we could do more, but we’re no help to anyone when we’re not at the top of our game. Take an early night, get some rest.” Hotch walked over to the door and held it open. “Keys to the rooms are at the motel front desk.” 

“Is there a pool?” Morgan joked as he shrugged his coat on. 

“I think they have cable,” JJ said hopefully, filing out behind the rest of the team. 

Reid brought up the rear, only Hotch behind him. The night shift had switched in, new deputies with fresher faces sitting at the desks, and the snow was falling still more thickly, drifting up against the window panes. If Larry Thatcher was still living, all they had was a hope that he was somewhere protected from this. It felt wrong, it always did, to be going to a warm bed when there was someone out there, scared and alone and depending on them for help, and knowing that there was nothing else they could do tonight didn’t make that any easier to accept. 

* * *

The motel rooms weren’t the nicest they’d ever stayed in by far, but at least the water pressure was great, or at least far better than the showers in the FBI gym. Reid hadn’t felt clean since he’d stepped in blood this evening, and the hot water hammering down on his skin did wonders. 

They only had pretty terrible quality generic black tea, but it was better than nothing, so Spencer set the coffee machine on to brew some hot water as he changed into his pajamas. When the tea was steaming in his mug, he settled cross-legged onto the bed and opened up the Bible from the drawer. It wasn’t like he didn’t know the verses, but reading might help him get into the unsub’s head and understand what he was thinking. 

Ever since the Hankel case it hadn’t been enjoyable, to say the least, to read all the fire and brimstone and curses of the Old Testament. Spencer had never been a fan of people using the Bible for their own ends — growing up bisexual in a state that bordered the Mormon corridor would do that — but even with all those bad experiences, he couldn’t help but reread it, no matter how uncomfortable it made him. It was such a popular source of delusions. Even though he tried to remember how many people clung to the words for comfort, how much it helped them through horrible things, it would still always be jarring, he thought, the dichotomy: it never made sense to him how people could say that God was a God of love and then turn around and do things like this. 

It wasn’t long before his head started to swim with “thou shalt not” and “the Lord spake unto Moses” and “burn them upon the altar,” and the room felt smaller and smaller around him, like the ugly orange wallpaper was closing in. The words were becoming less like words and more like a montage inside his head, and those images were the last thing he wanted to see right now, so Spencer shut the Bible harder than was probably necessary and practically leapt off the bed and in the direction of the sliding glass doors, covered by thick (also orange) velvet drapes. Maybe the cold wouldn’t fix things forever, but it could take him out of the tightening spiral, get him back where he needed to be and out of the claustrophobic feeling of four walls pressing nearer, and that was the most he could hope for. 

It took a little effort, but he managed to wrench the curtains apart, expelling what seemed like years of dust in the process, and then slide the doors open. Thankfully, there was a roof that kept the small patio from being covered in the snow. Out here, it was bitter enough to shock Reid’s skin, his breath puffing out in the air, and second by second, his body started to focus more on the less-than-ideal atmosphere than whatever was going on inside his head. It was muffled and quiet from the inches of snow on the ground, everything blanketed so that only the soft corners of cars and steps and mailboxes were visible. Maybe it was too cloudy to see the stars, but every inch of the world was sparkling, in the dull glow of the moon and even the streetlights, casting off from the whiteness of the ground and illuminating the world in multicolored light. 

“It’s pretty, isn’t it?” 

Spencer started and turned; to his left, JJ was leaning over her own balcony, looking amused. “I was out here before you, Spence.” 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Yeah, it’s beautiful, I just…” 

She laughed with her mouth closed and tilted her head to the side, her blonde ponytail falling over her shoulder. Her eyes were cast down at the ground, heavy, and her shoulders slumped too as she hugged herself. “Feels weird to think that in the middle of the case, huh? That guy, Ruth’s husband… I don’t even want to think about the kind of hell he might be in.” 

“Pretty much,” he agreed. The concrete was cold through his socks. 

“You doing okay?” 

“Everyone keeps asking me that, and I just… don’t know how to respond.” He chewed on the inside of his cheek for a second. “I’m not catastrophically failing, but every so often, something will happen and it’s like everything stops except for what’s happening inside me, and I can’t be trapped inside my own head and do my job.” 

JJ nodded and braced herself on the railing, looking down between their separate balconies to the floor below. “Have you talked to anyone about it?” 

“Um, not really,” he said honestly. “Hotch. A little.” 

“It helps,” she said. Reaching into her pocket, JJ pulled out her phone and speed-dialed, and Reid didn’t know where she was going with this, but he trusted her, so he stood up straight and put his hands in his pockets and just watched. 

The phone connected and an expression crossed JJ’s face that Spencer couldn’t name, something sad but so tender it almost felt wrong to see. “Hey, Pen, um… hi. Reid’s here with me, but — it’s okay.” He frowned, confused, but didn’t stop her as she went on. “What are you wearing?” 

They were close enough together that they could probably reach out and touch hands across the gap, so Reid could hear Garcia’s response pretty well. “Honey, any other time you know I’d tell you to sit your hot butt in front of a webcam so we could do this right, but no offense, I’m really not in the mood after intensive research on animal cruelty charges, I’m sorry.” 

“No, no, that’s not what I meant.” Despite herself, she laughed a little, lowly. “I just…” JJ looked up at the sky, like she was trying to find the stars though the clouds. Her eyes were glittering with tears, beaded on her lower eyelids, Reid could see them catch even the low light. “I just like to think of your office. And you in it, all bright. Like a rainbow.” 

“Is it cloudy out there, J?” Garcia’s voice was a little tinny through the speaker, but still soft. 

“Really cloudy. Yeah. No moon, no stars.” JJ pressed her hand to her mouth. “I can’t stop thinking about the guy who’s missing, his family, how much worse it might get. It’s… God. I just need that light.” 

There was a pause. “I don’t think even my outfit is bright enough to block that out, baby,” Garcia said. “Although I did get a major stink-eye from Strauss on her way in today.” JJ let out a noise that was half-laugh, half-sob. “I’m wearing yellow, as it turns out. Um, bright yellow pajamas, with white polka dots. I’m at home on the couch doing this list for Hotch. And I wish you were here. So you let me be the sun for you today, okay?” 

“Okay,” JJ whispered. She blinked and a teardrop fell, silently, thickly, from her lashes to her cheek. 

“And you go catch the bad guys like you always do, superhero. And I’ll be up for a while, so don’t hang up if you don’t want to, or you can call me back, or...” Garcia trailed off and hesitated, then her voice came through again. “Hey, I love you.” 

“Love you too.” And there was the soft beep of JJ ending the call, and then it was so quiet that they could almost hear the snow falling. 

Spencer was speechless, at first, and he didn’t want to break the gentle silence; he watched JJ wipe her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt and when she was done, he said, soft, “I didn’t know.” 

“No one does,” she said quickly. “Um, no one did. Until now.” 

“JJ…” 

“You share, I share,” she joked, and her voice was still a little thick, but it made the both of them smile, sorely needed. 

“It’s really… It means a lot that you told me first,” Spencer said. 

JJ smiled and looked over at him from under her eyelashes. “If I didn’t tell you, you would have never figured it out. And I think Morgan and Prentiss are on their way to getting it. I’m just giving you a head start. You know I love you, but you wouldn’t recognize this kind of thing if it came up and slapped your ass, and I’m including in your own life.” 

“Hey! That’s not very nice.” Struck by sudden inspiration, Reid scooped a handful of snow up into his palm and mashed it into a shape that kind-of sort-of resembled a ball, and tossed it over in JJ’s general direction. It didn’t even come close to hitting her, but she still made a noise of indignation, and in that moment Spencer remembered that not only had JJ spent her whole childhood playing organized sports, but also that she was only second to Hotch in her marksmanship score. 

Thankfully, it didn’t seem like she actually wanted to make Spencer have to change his pajamas, because she landed a hit solidly on the railing instead and just sprayed him lightly with snow. Nevertheless, he couldn’t stop himself from yelping at the cold wetness, in between the laughter that had snuck up on him, taking his glasses off to wipe off the splattered droplets. 

The sounds were almost too loud, echoing around the main street, and JJ shushed him almost drunkenly until they both were able to get their giggling under control, until they were just hitching out a laugh in their breathing every few seconds. 

“Thanks, Spence,” she managed to get out, clutching the stitch in her side and grinning over at him. 

“For what?” 

“I don’t know.” One side of her mouth twitched up. “Listening, I guess.” 

“We’re friends, JJ, of course I would listen to you.” 

“Well, coming out is usually different, so…” She hitched one shoulder up and pulled her sleeves down over her fists. 

Spencer blinked in confusion. “You know who you’re talking to, right?” 

“Yeah, or, at least I was pretty sure,” she smiled, “which is why I went to you first. And I’m glad I did. Talking to Garcia made me feel better, she always does, but telling you felt good too. I’ve just… As much as it scares me, to make things… real, I guess, I don’t like holding on to secrets that long, especially from my family. Plus, it always feels good to make you laugh like that. God knows you need it.” 

“I feel better too,” Reid said, and he meant it. 

For a few moments, they stood in companionable silence, until JJ yawned so hard that Reid heard her jaw crack. “God, okay, I think I’m gonna turn in. You should get some sleep too, okay?” 

“I’m gonna try,” he promised. JJ had made it back inside and was closing her door when he suddenly remembered something she’d said, and called her name. “Hey!” 

Through the gap in the door, she stuck her head back out. “What’s up?” 

“What did you mean when you said I wouldn’t know a relationship if it came up and slapped my ass, even in my own life?” 

Hearing Spencer quote her own words back at her was evidently pretty funny to JJ. “I just mean… you’re kind of oblivious to that kind of thing, Spence.” 

“I am not!” 

“Remember that actress? She basically had to kiss you for you to realize she was flirting with you.” 

“Okay, that was _one_ time, am I never gonna live that down?” 

“Absolutely not,” JJ said solemnly. 

“Well, you could help me out, in the future,” he suggested, and for some reason he felt a swoop of nervousness, could hear it in his own voice, too. 

“How about this,” she countered. “If you think you need help, then you come ask me, okay?” 

Spencer’s brows drew together. “That’s a little counterintuitive. You had to tell me about you and Garcia, how would I-” 

When JJ rolled her eyes, he knew it was fond. “Good night, Spence.” 

Just like when he was a kid, the snowball fight, however non-serious, had made him tired, and then the rest of the day came rushing up to greet him, weighing him down. Crawling into bed felt like a gift rather than just something he had to do to get to the next morning, and mercifully, when he closed his eyes, he didn’t dream of anything at all. 

It didn’t last nearly long enough, though, and the room was still full of that specific flat hotel room darkness when there was a knock that jolted Spencer awake. 

He was out of bed and halfway to the door before he even really had a coherent thought. Rubbing his eyes, he peered through the peephole, then pulled the door open and squinted into the light for a second; he hadn’t had time to grab his glasses, let alone put in contacts. “What time is it?” he mumbled. 

The vaguely Hotch-shaped blob in front of him settled into marginally better focus. “About 6:30. We’re going to try and get ahead of the unsub by staking out churches, just in case; once the sun comes up, we’ll go back to the woods, and tackle any leads Garcia could get us.” 

“Okay,” Reid said blurrily. “You think he’s gonna escalate?” 

“It’s possible, and we just want to be prepared for every scenario.” That, Reid had learned, was Hotch’s way of saying that he was too restless to just wait for another body to appear, and he’d never been more grateful to hear it. 

“It’s true, we don’t know how he’ll react to having a live victim.” 

“Exactly.” Hotch’s head bobbed for a second, like maybe he was looking Spencer up and down, although he was still mostly too blurry to be sure. “Be at the sheriff’s station in fifteen. And Reid…” If Reid could actually _see_ him, he was sure that he would see that Hotch was smiling, just the tiniest bit but still enough to make his dimples appear, carved even deeper in his face than the worry lines and wrinkles from the job. “Brush your hair.” 

He was already walking over to JJ’s door to make the same call, and Spencer waited until he was totally out of sight to touch his hair. It was completely stuck up on one side. 

Twelve minutes later he was letting the lobby door slam behind him, his coat flapping in the wind, a cup of tea clutched in his hand, and crossing the street with as small steps as he could take. He lost traction at one point and almost fell flat on his back, but a hand on his shoulder caught him and kept him upright, even made sure his tea stayed inside the cup. 

Emily shook her head at him and guided him by her grip to the sidewalk. “This is why you need big boy shoes, Reid, not just Converse.” 

“But they’re my shoes,” he said bemusedly. 

“They won’t be your shoes for long if you slip and fall and need a cast,” she said, holding the door open as they both went inside. 

With his contacts in, this time Reid could actually make out Hotch’s face in the fluorescent lights that contrasted sharply with the darkness outside. “Good morning. Prentiss, you’re going with Deputy Robbins to stake out Church of the Holy Redeemer, out on the southern edge of town. Reid, you’re coming with me and JJ to start setting up for the search party when the sun comes up. We’ve asked all of the local churches to reach out to their congregants, and we’re hoping that locals will have knowledge of the area that we don’t.” 

Emily nodded. “Have you heard from Garcia yet?” 

“She sent me a list of all of the school dropouts and students who didn’t re-enroll within the past 30 years, but as you’d imagine, it’s fairly long, even narrowed down to only males who lived outside the center of town.” Hotch’s mouth tightened, about the most outward frustration he usually exhibited. Any dead end was worse when they were under a time crunch, even if it wasn’t the only path they had. “We’ll move on to that later in the day.” 

It wasn’t long before they were in the car, driving the same path to the forest’s edge as last night, but this time with the rising sun behind them instead. Hotch pulled in right next to the tent that some of the deputies were already setting up, and JJ opened the door as soon as the car stopped moving, sinking into the snow almost up to the tops of her boots. As she made her way over to them to start to organize the sign-in table, Reid got out of the back; upon urging from pretty much the whole team, he’d borrowed a pair of galoshes that more or less kept him from being totally snow-bound, and as much as he didn’t want to admit it, they were seriously helpful. 

The snow was no less pretty this morning than it was last night, but everyone was aware how much of an impediment it was going to be in the search. There were no snow plows to go over and clear the paths in the woods, leaving everyone to their own devices to struggle through the knee-deep drifts, and it was also entirely possible that everything useful had been covered up by the snowfall. “January is the snowiest month in West Virginia, with an average of about eight days of snowfall, and with low temperatures, it’s possible that the snow could stay on the ground for the whole month,” Reid said as they made their way over to the entrance once more. 

“Don’t I know it,” Ulrich said. “The few times we’ve found bodies here, it’s been after the thaw.” 

“So time is of the essence,” Hotch said grimly. “We have one advantage, and that’s that our unsub isn’t trying to hide what he’s doing.” 

“The weather’s sure giving him a hand,” the sheriff admitted. “Fresh snow makes it near impossible to track him.” 

“Or not,” Reid said suddenly, his breath going short, his stomach plummeting. The sun was coming up over the edge of the mountain and spilling its pink light over the valley; JJ shaded her eyes and peered in the same direction that everyone else had turned to. 

In the middle of the forest, about halfway up the side, there was a plume of smoke, made visible by the dawn, emerging from the trees proud and tall and clear. 

“Sheriff, do you have that map of registered residences within this area?” Hotch said. Spencer saw his jaw clench, and knew that Hotch felt it, too, but he was checking anyway, just in case, on the slim possibility that things were, for once, better than they seemed. 

Ulrich pulled out the map he’d printed out and scanned it, then shook his head. “Nothing there. Last time something in this area was registered was, uh, 1959.” 

“Let’s go,” Hotch said, and they were halfway down the path and almost into the forest before Spencer remembered to breathe, his body taking over, running the same familiar program that never got easier. The air was cold and painful and it was like he could taste the smoke already, solid as the dread in his chest, burning his nostrils, acrid on his tongue, infiltrating into his bloodstream as if it never really left in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, that's another chapter done! this is the shortest of all of them, and then next week is the big one. i'm really really excited to finish it out.
> 
> thank you to everyone who's commented, subscribed, or left kudos. it truly means so much to me to hear from you! please, if you're enjoying this fic, consider letting me know -- it's the most encouraging thing you can do for a writer :)
> 
> you can also find me on tumblr [@seaborns](https://seaborns.tumblr.com) and twitter [@memoriesgIow](https://twitter.com/memoriesgIow) <3 questions and general yelling about cm/hotchreid are much appreciated


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [the playlist for this fic is now available in full!](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2NX1zDH1BUan6lSjhKucAC?si=e5c48846e74042ca)
> 
> and here's the longest and final chapter. hope you like it.

What it really felt like, Spencer thought disconnectedly, struggling through the shin-deep snow, was in animal documentaries, during the hunt. The editing was all pounding heartbeats or drums, quick cuts, ragged breathing. The only difference was that Spencer felt like the prey instead of the hunter, which made no sense; they were the ones chasing a killer. He couldn’t shake that sensation, though, the impulse to look over his shoulder, the looming fear in the background coming to life with every second spent tearing upwards to God knew what.

Hotch was in front of him, making it look much easier than it really was, occasionally reaching behind to help Reid stumble over a log or up atop a rock. Both of them were gasping, their noses running, Ulrich at their heels. Reid wasn’t sure how long it had been — he’d heard JJ on the phone with the rest of the team, somewhere distantly in the back of his mind before they’d lost sight of her, but that could have been an hour ago for all he knew. As they got deeper into the forest, the snow got thinner thanks to the tree cover, but it still wasn’t easy. 

“We’re almost there,” Hotch was shouting; he must have been able to see smoke, but Reid couldn’t, he was half-blind with the sweat in his eyes. They made it up onto a clearing, and there was a rotting cabin at the other end, nearly fallen in on itself. It had a stone chimney that was standing strong, and there was smoke pluming out of it, and from holes in the roof, too. 

They approached it slowly, panting out huge clouds. Spencer felt the grip of his gun against his palm without even registering the fact that he took it out. “Car on the right’s snowed in,” Ulrich said under his breath; it was a beat-up indiscriminate red pickup truck. 

“We’ll take the house first. If he’s still there, it’s not like he can drive away,” Hotch said. “Sheriff, you go around back in case there’s a back door, Reid and I will take the front.” 

The world was shuttering in snapshots again as Reid tried to breathe, following Hotch up the steps. They were old and the boards bent wetly beneath his feet, not even creaking under the weight, too decomposed to make noise, but they made it up and to the porch. Holes through the wood revealed wild tangles of vines that grew from underneath, gone dead for the winter, lifeless and grey. The door was ajar, and Hotch stepped back, nodded when Reid met his eye. 

Spencer turned the doorknob and pushed the door open with his shoulder and stepped inside, turned first to his right, and then his left, automatically, like he’d done a thousand times before. It was just one room, a hunting respite or something, without even a stove, but the other end had a fireplace that was lit and burning and filling the room with smoke, enough to make Spencer’s eyes hurt, enough that he had to hack out a cough. 

Things were blurry, but there was blood all over the floor, ridiculous amounts of it, covering the wide pine boards and laying shiny and dark and thick in puddles. The fire was so hot and bright that Spencer could feel it from the doorway, and it threw everything else in the room into black relief against the wildly flickering light. 

As soon as he breathed in, the smoke filled what felt like his whole head, and if he thought he’d smelled smoke before, that was nothing compared to this. All he could smell was burning wood and flesh, heavy and close, and like a foot in his chest, he was kicked back to the cabin with Tobias Hankel, the fish guts and the Book of Tobit, how he still sometimes woke up with that acrid tang inside his nose, and he knew that it was different, he _knew_ , but he couldn’t separate it, now, choking on the air, surrounded. It was like a dream; he couldn’t get his lungs to fill, no matter how hard he tried, and then his body took over for his mind and he was running out the door, back the way he came, even though he knew he wasn’t supposed to do that, to leave his team, down the steps, to his hands and knees in the snow. He barely had time to drag in a breath before he convulsed and he was throwing up, so hard that tears sprang to his eyes. 

It hurt, and Spencer’s hands hurt where they’d hit cold snow and frozen ground, and his knees hurt through his pants, but the pain was better than the paralyzing fear he’d felt inside there. When he stopped, he braced himself on the ground and let the air wrack through his body and sting his nose. His mouth tasted foul. 

Beside him, there was a crunching sound, and then Hotch was kneeling down in the snow, tilting Spencer’s chin up with a hand. “Reid, are you all right?” 

Spencer nodded; he was still breathless, and it took him a second to gather his voice. “‘M okay now, yeah, I just had to…” He gestured to the ground. 

“What happened?” Hotch asked. He took his hand away, but kept it hovering in the air for a second, like maybe he thought Spencer was going to fall over, before he let it drop down to his side. 

“Smell memory,” Spencer said, and was surprised that he didn’t feel the instinct to lie to Hotch about it. He wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. His arms were starting to shake, so he sat back on his knees and looked at his palms, the skin bright red from the cold and pebbled with the imprints of quickly-crushed snow; they felt like they belonged to him, so he knew he was okay for now. 

Wordlessly, Hotch unraveled the scarf from around his neck and pressed it to Spencer’s hands, wrapping it around them. He squeezed almost imperceptibly, just a single rub of his thumbs over the surface. 

Spencer looked up at him. “I have puke on my hands.” 

The corner of Hotch’s mouth twitched as he let go. “You’ll have to be responsible for washing it, then.” 

“Was the unsub still there?” 

Hotch shook his head, and it was only now that Reid noticed that he was out of breath, too. “No. There were tracks out the back door, but the wind blew over them too much to be able to follow them. He had the higher ground; he probably saw us coming.” 

“License plates on the car?” 

“Nothing. He covered his tracks, probably drove back roads or on private property. It’s lifted, so he wouldn’t have a problem. It’s an old-model Ford, with a radio in it tuned to police frequencies, no prints, because he left the windows open and the snow blew in.” 

Reid wound the scarf tightly around his hands, felt the soft fabric tighten on the pink skin. “Have Garcia check our list of school dropouts for anyone who bought one of these cars. Maybe family members, too, if it’s old.” 

“As soon as we have cell service,” Hotch agreed. 

They sat there, their pants getting wet from the snow, until Reid blurted, “Did you find a body?” 

It was just a second, but Hotch hesitated. “Yes. It was partially burnt. Blood drained into the hearth, then a fire built up over it, a cross nailed on the chimney.” 

“I should go in and see,” Spencer said. 

“No, Reid, you shouldn’t.” Hotch caught his arm with one hand. “The rest of the team is going to be here to take care of it.” 

“So what else should I do, should I just sit around?” 

“Just take a few moments. Please,” Hotch added when Reid made a sound of frustration. “Do you need anything?” 

Closing his eyes, Spencer blew out a breath. “What could you even give me out here? Vomiting is the body’s natural response to either real or perceived stimuli that it thinks is going to cause harm. It’s perfectly normal.” 

“It can also be an indication of trauma. Spencer...” Hotch squinted out at the tree line, the sun hitting the snow almost enough to blind both of them. “It won’t get any better if you won’t talk about it.” 

Of course Reid was aware that Hotch was right, but his muscles were aching, his hands still stinging, and he couldn’t talk about it right now, right here, couldn’t add any more pain. It was right there, floating beneath the surface, but he knew that if he let all the feelings come up they’d wash him down, right into cravings and despair and want for things he wouldn’t let himself have, and he needed to be here, now. 

He wet his lips with his tongue. “I’ll — I’ll make you a deal.” 

“A deal?” 

“After this is over, Hotch, I swear to you, you can ask me whatever you want and I will be one hundred percent, totally honest with you. You can make me do a psych eval again, you can send me to counseling, you can — you can do whatever, but I want to help on this case. That’s what makes me feel better. I can help, so I need to.” Reid was glad that his hands were covered, because they were shaking at the thought of unfettered honesty, but he wanted that much; Hotch deserved that much. 

At first, he almost thought Hotch wasn’t going to react, but then he nodded, slowly, and turned back to Spencer. “All right.” 

“Thank you,” Reid whispered, and he knew Hotch was close enough to hear him. 

They didn’t get to say anything else, because then Morgan and Emily were bursting into the clearing, Rossi hot on their trail. At the sight of Spencer and Hotch sitting in the snow, they caught their eyes, and the look they exchanged as a team was all they needed. 

* * *

Back in the sheriff’s station, with a ginger ale (Morgan’s insistence) and wrapped in a blanket (Garcia had refused to call until she had video evidence of this happening), Reid was finally able to get information about the car. “So,” Garcia said, pushing her sparkly purple glasses up on her nose. “I checked your list of dropouts against anyone who’d registered owning a red 1960s-80s Ford pickup truck. I know you guys said this was a devolution that he was disorganized enough to leave his car, but this is a pretty specific thing, you understand, so unsurprisingly, there weren’t many results. I tried looking into parents, but that’s where things got dicey, paper records, small town, et cetera, ad infinitum. If I could, I’d put in a requisition form for every little town you guys visit that doesn’t have their files digitized, but, well, we don’t have all of ours either, so-” 

“Pen,” JJ interrupted, earning a weird look from Morgan, who had opened his own mouth to put Garcia back on track. She flushed to the roots of her hair and shrugged, and he raised his eyebrows at her, but didn’t say anything else. 

Reid was pretty sure that the nuances of their micro-expressive conversation were lost on Garcia, who tapped herself on the head with her pen a few times and continued. “Right. Sorry. Anyway, so I was not about to let something like a _vehicle_ slip through my tangled web. That’s like a big, juicy fly, and I have no excuse to let it go. So instead, I ran traffic violations and stops in the past 20 years involving red Ford trucks. As you’d imagine, that was a much bigger list, with out-of-towners, et cetera. But when I cross-checked it with the dropouts again, I snared a big ‘un.” 

Next to her face, a small write-up slip appeared on screen, then the driver’s license photo of a white man with brown hair, sleepy blue eyes, stubble, and a square jaw. “Three years ago, a man named Michael Prosper, 34 years old, was stopped for not having up-to-date plates on his car. He apologized and said it was his father’s and they mostly only drove it around the family property, but that he would get his pops to update it ASAP. Incidentally, Prosper was on our list because he was in the public school system until eighth grade, but did not enroll for high school, when his parents decided to give him an education more focused on Christian values at home.” 

The pictures disappeared, leaving Garcia’s face, looking distinctly pleased with herself. “Mike here is very much off the grid, as much as I am on it. We are inverse images of each other. Besides his driver’s license, this guy does almost nothing that can be traced. Doesn’t even have a credit card.” 

“What does he do for work?” Emily asked. 

“Uh, a bunch of seasonal labor,” she said, peering at her monitor. “Paid in checks. Looks like… logging, mostly, he’s done railway maintenance and road work too. His father and grandfather and, well, as far back as I felt like tracing, were all coal miners, and they’ve all lived here.” 

“Fits the profile,” Rossi said. “A reclusive loner who has a job in physical labor, access to vehicles, a strong and probably restrictive religious upbringing, and deep roots in Bird’s Eye.” 

“Oh, yeah, and the car he was driving when he got pulled over was, everyone say it with me—” 

“Red Ford pickup,” they all chorused. 

“And that’s why they pay you the big bucks,” she beamed at them. 

“Do you have an address for Prosper, Garcia?” Hotch flicked his eyes up to the screen. 

“Well, sort of. His address is a PO box — I think the family property is too rural to have a street address,” she said apologetically. “But thanks to property records, I do have directions to access it.” 

“How much property are we talking, mama?” Morgan was frowning, unconsciously, stroking his own chin. 

“A lot.” The way Garcia’s eyes sort of glazed over told Reid that she was looking for something else. “Looks like… about ten acres. Solidly within the good doctor’s geo profile, by the way. And — oh, okay, yeah, it just got passed into Prosper’s name when his father was put on life support; his mother died back in ‘02. Looks like Dad had a massive stroke. No siblings, just Michael.” 

“When did that happen?” Emily was rifling through her folder for something. 

“The stroke happened, um…” The furious sound of typing almost drowned out Garcia’s speech. “October 12th, and he declined and was put on life support at the very beginning of December. He’s been at the hospital at the University of West Virginia receiving experimental treatments for brain function, but it doesn’t look like they worked.” 

“Animals started disappearing in mid-October, and the first body was found in the first weekend of December,” Emily read from the paper, then looked up at everyone else. 

“And there’s our stressor,” Rossi said. 

“That hospital is in Morgantown, and not too far from Granville,” Morgan pointed out. “He probably has a radio for communicating while he’s working; picking up police frequencies would be easy, and that’s where he got the bodies.” 

“Yeah, I’m checking now, and…” Garcia blinked at her screen, and then her mouth fell open. “Looks like he signed in to visit his dad… oh, holy crap. On every day that bodies went missing.” 

“Any current employment, anywhere else he might be?” Hotch asked. 

“If there is, sir, it’s not on paper. Or, well, virtual paper.” Garcia caught the camera in her gaze and winced. “I know that there’s a lot of stuff that gets left off of records, and unfortunately that means it’s stuff I can’t be helpful with.” 

“No, you did some excellent work here.” Swiveling his chair, Hotch surveyed the evidence board again. 

“Oh, thank you, sir,” Garcia said, smiling. 

“This is plenty to get started with,” Hotch began to say, but a knock on the door made them all jump, and Sheriff Ulrich entered a moment later, his hat in his hand, his face so grave that Reid braced himself before he even started speaking.. 

“I’m sorry to interrupt you, but there’s been another abduction. Tommy Lawson. He’s 8. His mama sent him out to feed the cows and he never came back. Didn’t scream, didn’t hear any noises.” 

In tandem, they all turned to face him, the same wave of horror washing over the whole room. “The unsub’s never taken a child before,” JJ said, and she sounded dull, empty; maybe fear or shock would be there if she hadn’t heard this news a hundred times before. 

“If he’s making sacrifices, it would make sense,” Spencer said slowly, because he really wished it wasn’t true. “A sacrifice is supposed to be unblemished and pure.” 

“Nothing more pure than a child,” Rossi muttered. 

“Everything else hasn’t worked for him, so he’s moving on,” Emily said. “His practice with the dead bodies is over, and his experiment with actually killing didn’t make a difference.” 

“So he’s decided that this is the only way.” Out of the corner of his eye, Reid could see Hotch draw his hand closed, sharply, under the table. “We don’t have any time to spare. He’s obviously devolving, both in his killing and in his delusions. Morgan, Dave, I want you to go with some of the deputies and start to search the base of the woods. Our advantage here is timing. Last time he took someone we lost valuable time because of nightfall. He’s getting desperate now that we interrupted his ritual and he had to flee before completing it, and he took this boy in the middle of the day. Prentiss, Reid, you come with me to Prosper’s family land, and we’ll bring any officers we can spare. I doubt he’ll be there, but it might help us narrow down potential other locations.” Standing up, Hotch looked at them all, catching each of their gazes in turn. “I know we usually say 24 hours for a child abduction, but our time frame on this is much less forgiving. His practice is over, and he may believe this is his final opportunity. Please be smart and careful like I know you all are.” With a curt nod, he gathered his things off the table, hooking his gun onto his belt last. “Let’s stop this.” 

* * *

Every time he had to sit in the backseat of the Suburban, Reid felt like a kid, but it helped to be able to lean forward and rattle off directions to Hotch, who was driving. Emily was in the passenger seat, chewing her nails. It was so jarring to look out the window and see the sun; it seemed like this sort of thing should only take place under the cover of darkness, but there were bright and sparkling fields every which way, surrounded by dark slate mountains streaked with white. 

Rural wasn’t enough to describe land like this. The roads turned to gravel and then to dirt under their wheels, as houses got fewer and farther between, and nature got wilder and wilder. The marks of modern society were almost unseen out here, save maybe a satellite dish on the roof of a farmhouse. And while they drove farther out, clouds coalesced to cover the sun, preemptively setting the mood, hopeless. Everyone was quiet, grim, and Reid was still jumpy as if he’d been shocked by an electric current and could still feel the aftereffects under his skin. His forearm itched horribly, and he was fighting not to scratch it, keeping practically every other muscle in his body tensed. More than anything, his body was trying to pull him down and hit him with need so strong he couldn’t ignore it. 

“Reid,” Emily said, piercing through his concentration. “Where next?” She was turned around in her seat now, and he wondered how long she’d been staring at him. 

“Sorry. Um…” Spencer peered at the map, then out the front window, between Emily and Hotch. “Should be the next right, up here, between these two patches of trees.” 

It was a sharp turn — they had to make it late — and Hotch pulled the wheel as far over as he could, the tires spinning into the grass and earth until they got purchase on the packed dirt again. It was a long and, Spencer thought, unnecessarily ominous road up to the property, and the only indication that they’d crossed into private land was a wooden cross nailed on the right side of the road. 

Once they passed through the copses, thin and naked birch trunks reaching up towards the sky, there were barren fields full of broken brown stalks and clumps of dirt, and in the distance, a gathering of buildings, strips of paint missing on their wooden sides, their colors muted and greyed by weather. Reid couldn’t see any cars parked outside, just a rusted tractor and a few other obviously non-functional pieces of machinery, but Hotch still parked a hundred yards from the path to the farmhouse door anyway, two cruisers with deputies inside close behind. 

They all got out and drew their weapons as they approached the door. In the reflections of the dusty panes of glass, Reid saw them getting closer and closer, but he couldn’t see anything beyond but darkness. The windows looked like eyes, if the door was a hollow, shell-shocked face. Off by the barn, the deputies were fanning out, checking the outbuildings and sheds. (It seemed that not even a place this far out could escape the all-seeing eye of Google — Garcia had provided them with satellite images that showed the buildings on the property.) 

“Michael Prosper?” Hotch rapped on the door, and a layer of grime dislodged and floated into the air, coating his knuckles. “FBI, open up.” 

Predictably, there was silence from within, so they all stepped back; Spencer and Emily lowered their guns, still holding them with both hands, and then Hotch shoved his shoulder against the door, his whole body weight behind it, and it gave way, breaking around the lock with damp and mold. They flooded in, guns raised again. It was so dark inside, even though it was the middle of the day, that they reached for their flashlights and clicked them on. 

The living room was shockingly bare. The floors were plain, dull from age, and what little furniture remained was wooden, ascetic, straight-backed chairs and a bench that looked more like a pew than anything else. Family pictures hung on the walls, but only a few, faded with seasons of sunlight from their original overexposed black and white; from what Spencer could see when he passed by them, no one was smiling. The fireplace was the only thing in the room to lend any kind of warmth, and there was a large cross nailed above the opening, blackened slightly at the bottom from smoke. The floorboards in front of it were scrubbed to a lighter shade and shone in the meager light, enough that Emily’s shoes squeaked when she walked over the area. Reid’s stomach dropped nauseatingly to somewhere around his toes, but he didn’t have time to bend down and scour for evidence. Leaving it behind felt wrong, though, as he swallowed and turned back, even though there wasn’t a choice. 

All three of them exchanged looks before moving farther into the house; Emily was on the farther side of the house and walked through to the dining room, but Hotch and Reid followed the hallway in front of them, passing a stairway, to the kitchen. After the initial whip-around-the-corner-check-for-unsubs-hearts-in-throats movements, they drew apart and took a side of the room each. Much like the living room, it had only the essentials; rough-hewn cabinets lined the walls, above small, thick windows, and a squat potbelly stove sat along the inner wall. It was cold to the touch, and when Reid opened the door, it was totally empty, save for a few spiders that skittered into the corner at the sound of the metal-on-metal of the hinge. Hotch was checking the cabinets behind him, and when Spencer turned, he saw that they were understocked, too, just a few beat-up cans of beans and soup. 

To Reid’s right was a long, tall gun cabinet, and when he opened it, he saw that every slot inside it was filled. There were just three rifles, all of them old and slightly battered, and boxes of ammo lined up on the top shelf. Carefully, he touched Hotch’s shoulder and pointed to the guns; it didn’t necessarily mean that Prosper wasn’t armed, but the fact that he hadn’t taken them all was a minimal good sign. 

On the other side of the stove, Emily came through. “Clear in the dining room,” she said, quiet. 

Hotch didn’t answer aloud, just jerked his head towards the staircase they’d passed, and they filed back in the direction they came. Reid was closest, so he led, his mouth dry, his feet shaking as he climbed. The stairs were small and thin and narrow, and he had to duck under the low ceilings, plaster coming off and getting stuck in his hair and crumbling onto his shoulders. Hotch was behind him, his flashlight beam throwing Reid’s legs into shadows, and Emily brought up the rear. It was a tall staircase, and it felt like they climbed for much longer than normal before they reached the top. 

The floors were uneven up here, warped and bending apart at the seams, nails pushing out at odd angles, like the entire house was buckling in on itself. Reid turned left into the first room he could see, and saw, out of the corner of his eye, Hotch pass him and go to the next one. The bang of an opened door from the other side of the hall told him that Emily had moved that way. 

A plain bureau with a mildewed doily and a statue of an angel atop it were about the only things decorating the interior of this room. There was a twin bed with a threadbare quilt laid flat, and a layer of dust so thick that Spencer had to hold back a sneeze when he stepped in and disturbed it. The closet was empty, too, and even the drawers of the bureau just held peeling contact paper. The bedside table had a Bible in it and as soon as Reid saw it he slammed the drawer shut, not even on purpose, just as an instinct. 

This wasn’t anything like Tobias Hankel’s house (or what little he’d seen of it) on the surface, but it had the same feeling of a thin layer of respect covering up a whole lot of fear. The Bibles and crosses were like security cameras — _remember, God is always watching_ — which only made the whole place feel more like jail, with its empty corners and lack of anything that might make it seem like a home rather than just a building. 

Spencer backed out of the room and found himself in the hall again. The next open door that wasn’t already being taken care of was the bathroom, so he stepped inside. It was so dark inside that his chest constricted for a second, until he fumbled for a lightswitch and a single bulb flickered on above him. It was all cracked white tile, as dusty as the other room had been, and a single mirror-front medicine cabinet with spots of tarnish that made it almost impossible to see into. The hinges still worked well, though, and when Spencer unlatched the front, the cabinet swung open and revealed neat, lined-up orange pill bottles and glass vials, syringes still in their blister packs. 

Again, his first instinct was to close the door, and his pulse rocketed up as he did it, leaving him to stare into his own eyes. Through the clouded glass, he looked like a scared animal or something, like he was getting ready to bolt, and he did, turned on his heel and walked out of the room, because if he’d stayed there another millisecond he was going to look at those bottles, and if he saw what he was looking for he’d take them, slip them right into his pocket as easily as breathing. 

“Bedrooms are clear,” Emily was saying when Spencer came out and walked right into her. “Oh-! Hey, hey-” 

“There are drugs in the cabinet,” he said quickly, and faced the stairwell and wiped at his eyes with the inside of his wrist. Footsteps told him that one of the others had gone in to check for themselves, but he didn’t look back until he’d blinked away the wetness on his lash line. 

Reid hadn’t even realized that he was gripping his left forearm so tightly that the knuckles on his right hand were white until Emily touched his shoulder gently. She didn’t say anything, just pulled him into her a little, and he soaked up the contact, turning so he could hug her fully, burying his nose into the crook of her shoulder, her hair. When he let go, it felt too early, but he did it anyway, and the light seemed a tiny bit brighter, his chest a little less weighted. 

When Hotch came out, he looked harrowed, his hand resting on his holstered gun. “It looks like Michael’s father was sick for quite a while before his stroke. The medications in the cabinet all have his name on them.” 

“There’s a hospital bed in the far bedroom,” Emily said. 

“You know, it’s possible that since Michael was his father’s sole caretaker, he feels responsible for his decline,” Reid suggested, curling and uncurling his hands before finally putting them in his pockets. “He might feel that he’s failed to take care of his father, as is his Biblical responsibility.” 

“The attic’s behind us,” Hotch said, resigned, nodding to the only untouched door. 

“Looks like it locks.” Reid leaned in closer and tested it gingerly. 

“I’d prefer if you could open it some other way.” Hotch rubbed his shoulder. “There’s a reason Morgan does most of the breaking down doors.” 

“It _has_ a lock,” Reid amended, peering at the rusting keyhole, “but it’s not locked.” 

“None of the other rooms had locks,” Emily said. 

“So what was up here that needed to be hidden?” Hotch frowned, and drew his weapon again. 

Emily led them this time, turning the age-speckled knob carefully, and if the stairs to the second floor had been unreasonably narrow, these were closer to a ladder. It was drafty to the point that Spencer’s first thought was to look around for a broken window, and there weren’t even any lights at all, just two small windows on either side of the room and one on the far wall. 

Aside from a few boxes on the floor, it was as bare as the rest of the place had been, but it was also too small; from outside, there hadn’t been any difference in the square footage of each floor, and Reid had seen another window in the attic that wasn’t accounted for here. He stumbled over to the wall and leaned against it, then started knocking. It didn’t take long to not only hear a difference, but also to feel the edge of a door, under a thin layer of wallpaper, and slitting it open and finding the spot where the doorknob used to be was easy. 

Emily came over and helped him rip the paper off, revealing a whitewashed door with smudged marks from hands on its smooth surface, thigh-high — a child’s height — all the way up to eye level. When Reid hooked his index finger through the hole and pulled, it swung open, leaving a trail in the dirt on the floor like the wing of a snow angel, and he stepped through, his breath catching in his throat. 

Directly in front of him, covering the window, light trying to escape from around the sides but not quite managing, was a painting of the Crucifixion, the only color painting he’d seen in the whole house. Everything else was black and white, but the blood was red, livid in the beam of Reid’s flashlight, and it was everywhere; dripping from Jesus’s hands and feet, matting his hair under the Crown of Thorns, soaking his tunic where the spear stuck out from his side, dripping down his cheeks, mixing with tears. It made Spencer’s stomach turn, and he wasn’t even religious. 

To his left, Emily’s light traveled over the wall, revealing the Ten Commandments, painted directly onto the plaster in stark black capital letters. Reid stepped forward to join her, but almost tripped over something knee-height in front of him; when he looked down, he saw a pre-dieu, painted white like the room’s walls. Its shelf was comparatively large, but it had to be to hold the huge book that was nailed to its surface — a Bible, heavy, its spine peeling and splitting, its pages rippled, with gold edging that was worn off from endless paging over probably hundreds of years. He turned it to the beginning, using his finger as a bookmark, and saw a family tree drawn right onto the inside cover, between the nails fastening it down, with dates as far back as the 1800s. 

There wasn’t a cushion on the kneeler, just a hard board, and Reid swallowed hard when he saw what other adjustments had been made: strips of leather with buckles, both on the kneeler and along the bottom edge of the shelf. “Hotch,” he said, and from his right, Hotch left a small altar with half-melted candles from decades ago and came to stand over the Bible, taking it in. 

There was no need to spell out what this was for, but they met each others’ eyes anyway, all three of them, a silent moment of pity for Michael Prosper. Being forced to memorize the Bible or pray or whatever else, kneeling for hours on end; it was hard to imagine a situation where anyone could come out of that even remotely functional. 

The walk back down the stairs and to the first floor was quiet, and when they reached the porch again, the deputy who had been in charge of the search approached Hotch. “We didn’t find anything in the other buildings. Just your regular farm equipment.” 

“The house is clear, too,” Hotch said, dusting his hands off. “Crime scene tech should get here and examine the fireplace in the living room, if possible; we think there might be more remains there.” 

“I’ll radio it in,” the deputy affirmed, and headed in the direction of his cruiser, over the snow that was grey from footprints by now. 

“So if he’s not here, where else would he take a hostage?” Emily said, brushing her hair out of her eyes. 

“It has to be somewhere important to him,” Hotch said. “If he’s doing this because he feels guilty about his father’s failing health, or to try and improve it, then it will likely be somewhere important to his father, as well. He probably started draining and burning the bodies in his own home, then moved to the woods, where he’d grown up, where he probably hunted with his father. Tommy Lawson may even be a surrogate for himself at that age; he might feel as if his own shortcomings or inability to follow his father’s rule of law were sins that now reflect back on him.” 

“I can’t imagine they had a lot of fond family memories to look back on,” Emily muttered. “Even in the pictures, they all look like they’ve got yardsticks taped to their backs to make them stand up straight.” 

“The pictures,” Spencer realized, and started back towards the house, almost tripping over himself. 

Hotch and Emily followed him as closely as they could. “Reid, what about them?” Hotch caught up with him at the door and opened it. 

“They’re all taken in the same place,” Reid explained as he ducked inside, into the sparse room again. “I just need — any of them will do.” Reaching up, he grabbed the farthest-right frame from the wall and ran back out of the house, towards the deputy — Deputy York, who had yelled at them yesterday — who was putting his radio back. 

“I just let the sheriff know about the crime scene, they should be here within the hour,” he said. “Is there something else?” 

“How long have you lived here?” Reid asked urgently. 

York blinked in confusion. “Uh, my whole life.” 

“Do you know this place?” Spencer held the picture frame out in front of him, heard Hotch and Emily come up behind them. 

“Yeah, it’s… in the National Forest, there’s a couple waterfalls gathered together that flow into a pond that’s good for swimming. It’s a picnic spot, for families, y’know.” He swallowed. “It’s really called Folsom Falls, but most folks call it Promised Land.” 

“The Bible,” Spencer said, something flashing in his brain, a switch on a board lighting up,, and dropped the picture; Emily caught it before it hit the ground. 

“Spencer.” Hotch raised his eyebrows. 

Reid shook his head to clear it. “Upstairs, in the attic. The Bible was open to Exodus 3. Verse 8 is, ‘I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey.’” 

“Is there a camping area, a fire pit, something like that there?” Hotch asked. 

The deputy knit his brows. “Well, not really, but it used to be some kind of iron production site. There’s an old furnace there, at the other end of the clearing from the waterfalls and the pond, looks like a huge chimney. It’s big enough to stand in, if you’re a kid. They like to try and climb it sometimes, always fooling around.” 

“Oh, God,” Emily said, and they were running back to the car before Reid’s brain even caught up, his skin cold all over. 

“Do either of you have cell service?” Hotch said tersely. 

“Not yet.” Emily was buckling her seatbelt, then glanced over her shoulder, like she was checking that Spencer was still there. 

He was, and he had the maps unrolled, was following the route with a shaking finger. The paper was smooth under his touch, a strange detail that he couldn’t make leave his mind at the moment. “I think we’ll have it for a few minutes when we drive by town, but we’re much closer than everyone else is.” 

“Then that’s our fastest option,” Hotch said, and flipped on the sirens, pulling out of park so quickly that the car nearly tilted on the uneven surface. The spinning lights and wailing noise preceded them down the road, and finally the eerie calm was broken, no more pretending, just panic, surrounding them, thick not only in the car but in the air, like the layer of snow on the ground, covering everything. 

* * *

Unlike the abandoned cabin, there was a road leading up to the base of the trail where the picnic area lay; they’d still have to do some walking, but it saved them a good amount of time, and that was what they needed the most. Reid was glad that he was responsible for directions, because it gave him something to do other than hyperventilation. 

“I have service,” Emily said suddenly, sitting up straighter. 

“Call quickly,” Hotch said. “We can’t stop.” 

“Okay.” She pressed the phone to her ear, gnawing on her thumbnail, and it was like they were all holding their breath until it connected. “Morgan. Listen, I won’t have service for long. Prosper wasn’t at his house, but we think he’s taken Tommy to Folsom Falls, it’s a waterfall and picnic area in the forest. Get here when you can, but we’re going in.” A response came through, indistinct, and Emily said, “Yeah, okay. Yeah. We’ll see you there,” and hung up. A few seconds later, Reid saw the bars disappear from the front of her screen, and knew they were alone again. 

“You reached them?” 

“They’re gonna come as soon as they can, but we’ll beat them there.” They were already speeding into the forest, tree cover getting thicker, the incline of the road veering sharply upwards. 

“You want to turn right when the road splits,” Reid said, flipping to the closer map of the National Forest. Any jurisdictional issues with the rangers would have to be sorted out later, and if Reid knew JJ, she was probably already on the phone with them. 

The right side of the fork in the road was much steeper than the one that brought them in, and they climbed higher and higher. Not only were they not talking, but it seemed like none of them were even breathing, just ticking down the seconds until they could stop. Time seemed like it was draining at a molasses speed and escaping them all at once, wasting away outside the window. 

Finally, finally, they pulled into a gravel lot and Hotch put the car in park; they all tumbled out and, at Spencer’s instruction, headed up the trail marked with a yellow triangle, a gap in the trees, the path hollowed into the dirt from years and years of feet wearing it down. It was mostly clear of snow because the trees bowed from either side to cover it, but dried, gnarled roots stuck out, rivulets from where the snow had started to melt. Somehow, miraculously, they all stayed upright. At one point, Reid felt his ankle turn and touch the ground, a rock rolling out from under his foot, and pain didn’t even register, he just kept running, Emily behind him, Hotch in front, up and up and up like they really were going for the actual Promised Land. He had to assume the deputies were close, hopefully pulling into the parking lot themselves, but he wasn’t listening. 

Branches stretched out and snapped at their faces and their arms, snow and meltwater dripped down on them from above, but it was autopilot to go on and on, just searching for the bright yellow marks blazed on tree trunks to keep them on track. The path was less than a half-mile, Reid knew, even though it seemed like a marathon. 

When they broke out of the path, into the clearing, it was wide-open and blinding white with snow. The falls rushed in the periphery of Reid’s hearing, on the left, and on the right there were strained, muffled yells, and when he turned his head, still running, he saw the boy, bound up at the hands and feet and mouth, next to the huge brick furnace reaching into the sky. Someone — Prosper — was next to him, kneeling down at the base of the chimney, and they watched as he dropped a match into the hearth and flame ignited like a wave, like a wall, half as tall as a grown man. 

“Michael Prosper, FBI!” Hotch yelled. “Step away from the boy and show us your hands!” 

In a fluid motion, Prosper stood, a hand in the binding he’d used on Tommy, hauling him to his feet too, and raised something silver, glinting even in the clouded light, a wicked Bowie knife with a blade so sharp it frayed the rope that was serving as a gag when he pressed it to the side of Tommy’s face. 

“Put the knife down!” Prentiss was shouting, but Reid only half-heard her, his ears full of buzzing. He blinked and saw another knife, metal in the firelight instead of the sun, in the hands of Tobias Hankel, Raphael, whoever it had been, and when he opened his eyes he knew what he had to do. 

“Michael,” he said, and stepped forward. “You don’t want to hurt this boy.” Spencer lowered his gun and put it in his holster and closed it tightly. “I know you don’t.” 

“Reckon you’re right,” Prosper said. His voice was low, gravelly, slightly accented, dipping and rolling like the mountains. “Don’t see I have much of a choice, though.” 

“Killing Tommy won’t make your father get better,” Spencer said. He walked closer, slowly, and when Michael didn’t jump or move the knife, he kept moving. “I know you think that it will, because you think you don’t have anything else, but it won’t.” Prosper breathed out, heavy, through his nose, reminding Reid of an angry bull. Tommy was red in the face, but perfectly still, his eyes closed. 

“I know that your father wasn’t kind to you, Michael.” Reid was close enough to speak a little softer and still be heard, so he did. He could barely hear himself over the rush of blood, the pounding of his own heart. “But even though he used religion to control you, you still believe in God.” 

“You don’t know anything about me,” Prosper said unevenly. His eyes were darting from side to side and back again, but returned over and over to the fire, reflected large in his pupils. 

“God wouldn’t want you to kill anyone,” Reid said. He was less than twenty feet away now. “That boy right now? He feels like you felt when you were his age. He’s asking why God would let this happen to him.” 

Tommy squeezed his eyes harder and tears trickled down his face, wetting the blade of the knife, and Michael looked lost, for a moment, looked younger than the kid he was holding. 

“‘You can’t conceive, nor can I, the appalling strangeness of the mercy of God,’” Spencer quoted. “Sometimes things happen that are out of our control, but sometimes we _can_ stop bad things from happening. Your father should have stopped himself from hurting you, but he didn’t. You can’t undo that, Michael, and you can’t make him better, and I wish you could, I wish it very badly.” He was almost surprised to hear his own voice break with conviction. “But you love your father even though he hurt you. I’m… I’m not a religious person, but it seems to me that that’s about the best part of God you could show.” 

Spencer was standing right in front of them now, the boy and the man holding him, and he could see that the blade was shaking, and that Michael’s fingertips were white with how tightly he was gripping Tommy’s arm. “You can show that here, now, too, by letting Tommy go. If you need to, you can take me, instead, but you can stop this bad thing from happening to him. You can keep him safe, even though you couldn’t keep yourself safe when you were younger.” 

The air was thin between them, and when Reid met Michael’s eyes, he could tell he was thinking, the muscles in his jaw standing out, his eyes clouded over. Inside his head, Reid counted, _one, two, three, four,_ his hand resting casually on the grip of his gun, and before he got to five Prosper said, “Go on, boy,” and cut through the ropes that bound Tommy. 

Reid didn’t have to tell him twice; the boy broke out running at a breakneck pace, hopefully towards Hotch and Emily, but he couldn’t turn around to check, because then the knife was at his throat and Prosper was holding him instead. He dug a hand into Reid’s hair and turned him so Spencer’s back was to his front, so they were both staring right into the fire. It was hypnotizing, the way the flames jumped and danced, leaping high into the air. The pile of firewood had caught and was crackling and snapping, and it had gotten taller, consuming everything. The heat was enough that Reid could feel it, glaring onto his face. He thought of the last time he’d had a knife at him, and then remembered how Hotch had been the one he’d trusted instinctually, and how he had come, out of the darkness, that he was here now, and then, bizarrely, Spencer wasn’t scared breathless anymore. 

“You really think it won’t make him better?” Michael muttered in his ear. The knife dug into Reid’s neck. 

“I’m sorry,” Spencer breathed out by way of answer, and let his hand creep up to cover Michael’s, and when he closed it around the handle of the knife, Prosper let go, collapsing onto the ground like he took a bullet, shoving Spencer away from him. 

For the second time that day, Reid fell to his hands and knees, this time on the hot, rough concrete at the base of the furnace. He felt the skin on his palms tear, and his head dipped dangerously close to the fire; moving on instinct, he dropped fully to the ground and rolled away, sucking in a huge lungful of smoke as he did. By the time his eyes cleared and he got a full, clear breath, he saw a deputy — they must have arrived while he was talking Prosper down, but it seemed like he came out of nowhere — with a knee on Prosper’s back, locking the handcuffs, reading him his rights. Farther away, Emily was bent down to talk to Tommy, had a hand on his upper arm, and he was sniffling but nodding. _Yes, I’m okay._

Spencer blinked and coughed again, and when he opened his eyes this time, Hotch was running over to him, sliding into a kneel, reaching out and pulling Reid close. “That was incredibly foolish,” he said, completely at odds with the fierce embrace he had Reid in. 

“I’m okay, Hotch, I’m all right,” was all Spencer could think to say. He was hyper-aware of every inch of himself that Hotch was touching, every point of contact between them, his body seeking it out, letting him press closer. 

“I couldn’t lose you again,” Hotch said, more to the back of Spencer’s neck than his ear, he was holding him so tightly. 

“You didn’t lose me in the first place.” Reid swallowed shakily and clung on, and he was too tired to pretend he wasn’t, to pretend he didn’t need it. “No one lost me.” 

“No, but I’m the one you told and I came and I _found_ you,” Hotch murmured, and even though it was obvious, Spencer realized at that moment like he hadn’t before that Hotch wasn’t talking to anyone else, that he was the only one who could hear him, and it was like being put back together again piece by broken piece. “And I don’t care how many times I have to do it, I will, again and again, Spencer, I-” 

The world narrowed down so abruptly that Reid almost thought he was going to pass out, but then he stopped thinking altogether and turned his head and fit his mouth against Hotch’s so easily that it seemed as if it should have happened from the very beginning. 

When they broke apart, the first thing Spencer noticed was that Hotch had blood smeared across the side of his jaw. “Are you hurt?” he asked automatically, his head spinning. 

Strangely, incredibly, Hotch was smiling. “I’m fine. I think he cut you a little bit, you’re bleeding, but it’s not deep.” 

“Oh.” Spencer pushed himself up into a sitting position and swallowed hard. Reality was crashing over him now that the adrenaline was receding, and it was freezing cold and tinged with embarrassment. “I — Hotch, I’m-” 

“If you’re about to apologize,” Hotch interrupted, “don’t.” 

“I kissed you and I didn’t even ask first!” 

“Your emotions are running high. I was surprised, but I’m not…” He was still holding Spencer by the shoulders, but now he reached a hand up and rubbed a thumb over his cheekbone. “It’s not unwelcome.” 

“It’s not?” Spencer could barely breathe, for the nth time over the past few days. 

“No,” Hotch said, and the word had never sounded happier. His smile was so genuine and Spencer so rarely got to see it that it was like sunlight, warmer than the fire roaring behind them. 

“JJ says I’m not very good at recognizing relationships.” 

“Apparently, neither am I,” Hotch said, and slid his hand down to rest on the straps of Reid’s vest again, every place he touched seeming to glow on Spencer’s skin. “We should sit up now.” 

“Do you think Emily-” 

“Let’s just focus on getting Tommy back and processing Prosper for now,” Hotch said. “We have time to talk, or… deal with anything, I promise you.” 

For some reason, that thought made him stronger, like it had sealed something inside him. Hotch helped him up and they started to walk towards Emily, but before they got too far, Reid said, “Wait,” and touched Hotch’s arm lightly. 

“What?” 

“I told you that you could ask me whatever you wanted when the case was over, but there’s — there’s one thing I want to say to you, without you having to ask.” He opened his mouth, closed it again, then finally managed to order his words. “You thought that I was too close to this because of the Tobias Hankel case. And you were probably right. Hotch, I have an eidetic memory, I can’t forget a single second of that case. I’ve lain awake at night trying to, but I-” Spencer cut himself off, feeling his stomach twist. “I’ll always remember that, there’s nothing I can do about it. But it also means I remember every interaction I’ve had with the team, every good time we’ve had together.” He swallowed and met Hotch’s eyes; it almost hurt, it was so much, like everything he was feeling was too big to be held by his body. “It means I remember every second I was falling in love with you and had absolutely no idea about it until now.” 

Hotch’s face softened; years seemed to drop off his face. “That has nothing to do with an eidetic memory. That’s what it’s like, Spencer.” Between their bodies, out of Emily’s line of sight, he took Spencer’s hand and stroked his thumb over the skin, a brief, electrifying moment of contact before he let it drop again and they started to walk again. They didn’t get much closer before Morgan burst off the path, breathing hard, Rossi and about twelve deputies behind him, bringing up the rear. 

Watching their faces shift to relief at the sight of Tommy, safe with Emily, was enough to remind anyone that good still existed in the world. When Spencer breathed in this time, he tasted relief, finally, full and clear and sweet. He realized he was smiling, for a thousand different reasons, and that was a rare and beautiful thing on a case. 

* * *

The mood in the station was completely different than it had been the last time Spencer had been there, before the sun was up. Everyone had a smile on their face, no matter how weary or tinged with sadness it might have been, and the sight of Tommy sitting in the middle of the station, his mom holding both of his hands in her own, crying happy tears for once, was like a miracle; no one could stop looking. 

The medics had finished with Tommy fairly quickly, since he was unhurt except for a few bumps and bruises, but now they had moved on to Spencer, who was making their job difficult, because he kept looking around the bullpen, searching for a head of dark hair, unable to stop himself. “Dr. Reid, please,” the man trying to put a bandage on his neck said with exasperation. 

“Sorry,” Spencer said hastily, and sat up straight again, tilting his head to the left to give better access. His hands were already bound up tightly and stinging from being disinfected; it was barely a brushburn, but Hotch had given strict instructions that everyone’s injuries should be treated, and met Reid’s eyes so deliberately that he had no excuse to pretend he hadn’t heard it. 

From across the bullpen, JJ emerged out of the throng of people and made her way over to sit in the chair next to Reid. “Hey, Spence,” she said, a thankful kind of satisfaction etched in every line of her face. 

“Hey,” he said back, and winced at the bite of the antiseptic in his cut. 

She pouted in sympathy and took out her phone. “I’m gonna call Garcia and let her know we got Tommy back safe and got Michael Prosper in custody.” 

“Oh, okay,” Reid said interestedly, and turned towards her as much as he could without causing any more problems for the medic. Garcia always had reactions much stronger than the rest of them, which made it hard to tell her when a case had gone poorly, but on the other hand, sharing good things felt ten times better. The way JJ was smiling right now as she was waiting for the call to go through told him that maybe this was one of the things that had originally led them together. 

“Hey, Pen,” she said, “Spence is here with me getting patched up, I’m gonna put you on speaker.” 

With a click of a button, Garcia’s voice echoed from the cell phone. “Oh- Okay. Hi, boy wonder, you all right?” 

“Yeah, I’m good, really,” he said. “I just fell.” As if to confirm his statement, the medic stood up, snapping the first-aid kit shut and taking off his gloves, giving Reid a quick nod before heading back towards the front desk. 

Garcia clicked her tongue. “Reid! Honey!” 

“Trust me, I think we’ve already all chewed him out, but there’s a reason. If you haven’t heard the good news yet, I just wanted to let you know…” JJ’s eyes fell closed and her smile only grew. “Tommy Lawson is safe, he’s right here, we can see him with his mom. And Spence talked Prosper down, he surrendered and it was a clean arrest. He’s giving a confession now.” 

Garcia gasped. “Oh, Jayje, that’s _wonderful_.” Her voice sounded thick, and Spencer could tell she was holding back emotion when she said, “I can’t wait to see you again.” There was a beat where she caught herself, then, “All of you guys,” she added hastily. 

JJ laughed. “It’s okay. He knows, remember?” 

“Oh, right. Sorry, I keep forgetting.” 

“By the way…” She bit her lip and glanced over the bullpen, where the door to the sheriff’s office opened and Hotch came out. “How’s that paperwork coming?” 

“Well…” The familiar sound of typing started up again in the background of the call, crunchy through the airwaves. “I’ve been… somewhat ignoring it for the past few days because I was so worried about all of you and I can’t focus on filling out boxes when I’m worried, angel, you know that.” 

“I do,” JJ allowed. “Can that be my present for getting home in one piece, though? I don’t- I’m tired of hiding this, Pen, I just wanna be able to-” 

“I know,” Garcia said gently. “Me too.” Her tone grew more stern. “But if you think I’m giving you a present for not getting injured, you have a one-way ticket to Crazytown. That is all kinds of an incentive that has implications I’m _not_ prepared to accept.” 

They bickered back and forth for a few more seconds, but Reid wasn’t really listening; he was watching Hotch as he crossed the bullpen, bending down next Tommy and shaking hands with his mom. He couldn’t help it, it was like his eyes were on a fixed track, noticing that Hotch’s hair was messed up, that he had a bit of a five-o-clock shadow, but that he was still smiling. 

“Spence,” JJ said, and he started. 

“Sorry, what?” 

She raised an eyebrow at him, her lips curling upwards. “I just said bye to Garcia.” 

“Bye, Garcia,” he said dutifully. 

“Oh, I _hate_ not being able to see you guys, I want details, Jennifer Jareau, _details_ ,” Garcia immediately cut in, and Reid could imagine her sitting up straight at her desk, twirling her pen, her eyes wide. 

“I love you, crazy person, I’ll see you soon,” JJ said over the stream of words that Garcia was still getting out, and hung up. When she shifted in her seat so she was facing Reid as much as possible, all she had to do was tilt her head a little, and Reid felt himself go red. “Do you have something to share with the class?” 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he feigned. 

“You seem a little preoccupied.” 

“I just stopped a killer! I think I’m allowed.” 

His voice jumped high, his tell, which JJ surely knew, but she just snorted and sat back. “Okay. Fine. But I _will_ get you back one day.” 

“I’ll tell Garcia on you.” 

“Didn’t you hear her? She’s on my side.” She waited a beat, like she was hoping he’d give in, then sighed and stood up. “Eh. I’m in too good of a mood to bother.” When she looked down, her eyes were soft. “You did a good job, you know.” 

“So did you,” Spencer said, tucking one leg up under him. 

“Yeah, well, I’m not the one who talked a killer down.” Her voice was just a little tight, and it didn’t make sense until it hit him; it was the barest tinge of envy, as strange as it might be to someone outside the situation. 

“JJ, what you do is important, too,” he started, but she turned her head away, almost rolling her eyes. Spencer tried again, a different approach. “You could be that person, someday, if you wanted.” It hadn’t occurred to him before, that JJ might want more, which was a little embarrassing, but it made sense. 

JJ blew out a breath. “I don’t know. Maybe. I like what I do, Spence, I just…” There were more than a few unsaid thoughts at the end of her sentence, and he could tell that she felt like it wasn’t the right time to air any of them. 

“Whatever you want to do, you could do it,” he said, and reached out and caught her hand. 

Surprised, she met his eyes. “Thanks.” 

They didn’t need to say anything else. JJ squeezed his hand and then let it go, went over to the corner where a reporter with a jacket marked _The Morgantown Sentinel_ was flipping through a notebook, and Spencer was alone again. 

He got up and scanned the bullpen, automatically doing a headcount; JJ had just walked away from him, Hotch was still speaking to Mrs. Lawson, Morgan and Rossi were packing up the evidence boards in the conference room, which only left Emily, and she saw him first, coming up beside him, into his field of vision. “Hey, you wanna take a walk?” 

“Do we need to help Morgan and Rossi?” 

She grimaced. “Need… no, I don’t think so. Want to, also no.” 

“Then sure,” Spencer said, and they went right out the front door. Hotch glanced back as they were leaving but didn’t stop them. 

Somehow, it wasn’t even dark yet. Days on the job were always ridiculously long, but this one was excessive even by BAU standards. Everything had changed in the hours since they’d gotten up this morning, so much that it felt unreal. The outside world, however, was remarkably unaffected. Cars trundled slowly down the street, avoiding piles of slush; families walked along the street, swerving to avoid each other, chatting amiably; the bell in the tower of the church struck the quarter hour. 

“Emily, you used to be religious, right?” he asked suddenly. 

“I don’t know about ‘used to,’” she sighed, not even taken aback, like she was expecting the question. “It’s a complicated area. To say the least. But I grew up Catholic, yeah.” 

He paused before saying, “How does it happen? That so many people- I mean, intellectually I know how religion gets tangled up with politics and used for all kinds of things, but I don’t personally understand why something that most people, if you asked them, would say is about love, becomes this force of — of evil.” 

“Well, that’s kind of the question, isn’t it?” She laughed dryly and shifted her weight from foot to foot. “I could give you a long and historically accurate or personally relevant story, but what I really think… I think that sometimes it’s easier,” Emily said, and she made an abortive movement around her chest, like she was grabbing a necklace that she forgot she wasn’t wearing, “to think that God is mad at us than to ask the hard questions.” 

“Like what?” 

“Like… if God loves us then why do bad things happen to us? Why would He allow humans to suffer? Is He there at all?” Emily squinted out at the scenery. There was some blood on her cheek, a scratch closed with a butterfly bandage; she must have gotten caught in the face with some thorns while they were running. “Thinking of God as angry is frightening, but not as much as uncertainty as when you’re raised with something your whole life and then have to question it. Faith is believing without seeing. And if you lose everything that you have right in front of you… it’s harder to keep a hold on something that’s not even physical. So they cling on even tighter, even if it hurts them, because otherwise, they’d have nothing left. They do whatever it takes.” 

Reid nodded and toed at the ground with his sneaker, boring a hole through the snow. It was muddy underneath. “I wasn’t raised religious, but I…” He couldn’t find the words to explain his dreams, the things he’d seen when his heart had stopped, the white light that kept coming up in his sleep, portents and omens of things not really seen at all. “Our job, it’s mostly bad things. And we learn to explain them as best we can. There are reasons behind why the bad things happen. Sometimes that makes it easier and sometimes it makes it harder, because even though we know what’s behind it, we can’t really stop it. But the times I’ve seen the most merit in believing in God... have been the times when I have the least explanation for what’s happening.” He hit a patch of grass, somehow still green in the middle of January. “The good things. The best things. The things that are almost miracles, and happen just because they can.” 

Emily looked over at him and smiled, and she didn’t have to say the words for Spencer to know what she was thinking, in that moment. “Maybe more believers should talk to people like you, then,” she said softly. “Kind of sounds like you get it more than they do.” 

This time, Spencer was the one to pull her into a hug, gathering his bandaged hands together behind her back. When he tucked his face in her neck, under the sweat and residual fear he could smell her shampoo, same jasmine scent as ever, and her hands were steady through his hair. Sometimes cases took things from him, made him feel like he was missing a limb or a chunk of himself, phantom pains yet to come, but moments like this were what made him start to be whole again. 

* * *

A short flight and an airport that was, to put it charitably, not busy, meant that they were able to get off the ground that same night. Spencer settled onto the couch, his back against the armrest, the book on fonts he’d brought from home spread across his lap, and desperately wished he could sleep, but by the time he even got comfortable they’d probably be landing. Nevertheless, he yawned so hard his ears popped as he watched everyone file in, maybe a little bumped and bruised but no worse for the wear overall. 

JJ and Morgan took one side around the table and Rossi and Emily took the other, and it didn’t take long for the cards to come out, a glint in Emily’s eye. Part of Spencer wanted to get up and kick all their butts, but the larger part of him was too exhausted to move, and when Hotch took a seat next to him once they were safely up in the air, nudging his feet gently over, he was glad. 

“You all right?” he asked for the millionth time. 

“I really am,” Spencer said. He was fighting a smile just at the sight of Hotch. 

“For the record, I don’t think you need another field evaluation,” Hotch said. “I know we all have cases that get to us. It’s natural. I just need you to tell me if you feel overwhelmed, or scared, because that’s natural too.” 

Reid nodded and bit his lip. “I was scared. At first.” 

“Oh, you don’t say,” Hotch replied, the tiniest hint of amusement in his voice. 

“But then… you were there, and I wasn’t anymore.” Reid fidgeted at the hem of his pants; that was too real, too raw, for him to look at Hotch while he said it, so he waited a few more seconds before he spoke again. “I really am sorry, Hotch.” 

“I hope you’re not trying to apologize for…” He broke off and tilted his head to the side with a lift of his eyebrows, in lieu of saying _kissing me_ aloud. “...again.” 

“No, I’m actually not sorry for that at all,” Reid said, and couldn’t stop himself from grinning when Hotch laughed. “I meant for worrying you, and not… not knowing how to talk about this.” 

“About what?” 

“About a lot of things,” he said honestly. 

“Spencer, it’s all right. I’m not the best talker either, you can just… We can just take our time.” 

The switch to first-person plural made Reid wonder how a picture could possibly be worth a thousand words, if just one word had the power to make him come undone like this. Hotch put a hand gently on his ankle, for a second, a single point of contact radiating warmth all through him, and they smiled at each other, and again he had that bursting-open feeling, splitting along the seams with light shining out of every gap. Even though he shifted his eyes back to his book, he didn’t read a single word. 

It was too soon when Hotch pulled away and said, “You know, there is one thing you could do to make it up to me.” 

The way the side of his mouth was twitching told Spencer he was joking, but he played into the bait anyway, idly turning a page, then looking up. “Hm?” 

“You could fill out the fraternization paperwork,” Hotch said hopefully. 

“The fact that they call it that is honestly strange,” Reid began, sticking his finger in his book to mark his place as he sat up. “Fraternization covers so many different relationships. If two agents have a one-night stand, do they have to fill it out? What if they work in different departments, what if they enter into a civil partnership for tax benefits-” 

“Reid, you’re not seriously going to tell me you don’t know the parameters of the form.” 

“No, I do, I just mean that it’s entirely too general, and if they weren’t already, they’re going to be busy at that office,” Reid said, then froze. He hadn’t _technically_ given anything away, but it was too close for comfort. 

He was still rapidly trying to think of a way to change the subject when Hotch spoke up. “Are you talking about JJ and Garcia?” 

_That_ was enough to make Spencer lower his book and goggle. “Wait, you knew?” 

“I try to be the kind of person my teammates trust,” Hotch said, his eyes flicking over to JJ. “And… Garcia can’t keep a secret to save her life.” 

“I don’t know whether to be offended or relieved that I don’t have to try and stay quiet.” 

“I haven’t known for long,” he admitted, “and I’ve been reminding Garcia to fill out the paperwork. But I’m happy for them.” 

“Me too,” Reid said. 

Again, Hotch touched his shin, gentle, and murmured, “Spencer.” When he had Reid’s attention, he said, “When we get back?” and it was clear, half-promise, half-question. Spencer nodded — he’d be shy about it if he weren’t so happy — and watched Hotch’s face change into that open expression once more, the look he’d seen more in the past day than in the past five years of working together. 

Out the window, the sun was starting to come down, lighting the clouds to orange, almost too bright. It was almost as if it was marking the end of the case. There was no snow in DC, Garcia had assured them, and the sunset was like a bookend to the days they’d spent among the mountains. Leaving cases behind was bittersweet at best, because there was always a downside, and there was the temptation to mull them over ad infinitum, wishing things had gone differently. That urge was less strong, though, when things ended well. They hadn’t saved everyone; they rarely did, but they were long used to that, and victories tempered with loss were still victories, still lives that got to go on. 

There was so much to come, yet, so many things to do, not just more cases, but things to figure out, conversations to be had, hard ones and much easier ones, days to live they couldn’t even imagine. It wasn’t the first time Spencer had rode home on the jet feeling like everything would be different once he exited this transitory space, but it was one of the only times that almost everything had changed for the better. 

* * *

_“Maybe our world will grow kinder eventually. Maybe the desire to make something beautiful is the piece of God that is inside each of us.”_  
**Mary Oliver.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there it is! i am so very fucking proud of this fic: what it became, the original idea, everything that i did to create it. i rarely write fic over 10k words, so this is very special to me, and i hope that you enjoyed reading it as much as i enjoyed writing it.
> 
> i have some thank-yous to give out to my very patient friends, none of whom are in this fandom, for suggesting songs for the playlist that spurred me to make this what it became, and for listening to me rant about writing this for so long even though it didn't affect them at all. i love you all SO much and i am so grateful to have such a wonderful support network. :hugz:
> 
> if you liked this fic, please let me know! every comment i get is a wonderful dose of serotonin and my kudos email keeps me going. you can also find me on tumblr [@seaborns](https://seaborns.tumblr.com) and twitter [@memoriesgIow](https://twitter.com/memoriesgIow) if you wanna chat about this fic, hotchreid, cm in general, or really anything.
> 
> thank you again for sticking with this, whether you read it all at once or chapter by chapter. it means more to me than you know. <3333

**Author's Note:**

> i've been working on this for about three and a half weeks and i'm really proud of how it came out. if you enjoyed it, please consider leaving kudos or a comment! they make my day and give me my daily recommended allowance of serotonin, seriously. you can also feel free to hit me up on tumblr [@seaborns](https://seaborns.tumblr.com) or on twitter [@memoriesgIow](https://twitter.com/memoriesgIow) — i'd be happy to chat anytime :~) however, i've only seen up to about midway through season 10 so pls don't spoil me lol.
> 
> i'll post the next update in a week! i've always wanted to post and complete a chaptered fic, but i rarely write things long enough to count, and i'm terrible at follow-through. so i decided that i needed to finish any chaptered fic i tried writing before beginning to post it. this one ended up fitting the bill and i'm very excited to get the rest of it out.
> 
> i really hope you liked this. have an awesome rest of your week <3


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